


Time and Again

by Loka_Senna



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Smallville
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crossover, Fix-It, M/M, Mpreg, Multi, Slash, Threesome, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-07-08
Packaged: 2018-11-02 17:30:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 7
Words: 43,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10949346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Loka_Senna/pseuds/Loka_Senna
Summary: Left alone with only an AI for company at the end of the world, Harry confronts Jor-El with some hard truths. A time-travel fix-it. SLASH, threesome, possible/implied MPREG in later chapters.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sifshadowheart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sifshadowheart/gifts).



** Time and Again **

**A Harry Potter/Smallville Crossover**

**_By LokaSenna_ **

**_Beta by Sif Shadowheart_ **

_Beta’s Note: Heh, well… surprise surprise, it’s another crossover, though I passed it off to LokaSenna to write instead of writing it myself when I got inundated with work and my other stories, etc.  They’re such a doll...  Anyway.  So this one I don’t even know what to blame on.  There was a meme and a conversation, etc. etc. and then this happened.  Obviously this is going to be very A/U for Smallville and EWE for the Harry Potter series.  We also have SLASH and MPREG going on here with an all-male threesome._

_Author’s Note: I know what to blame it on.  This is all Sif’s fault.  She did this and then_ her _plunnies stole_ my _brain._

_ Disclaimer:  Harry Potter and Smallville are the property of their respective owners, no profit or infringement was intended by this piece of fan-authored fiction. _

 

**Prologue:**

**Cold to the Bone**

_The Fortress of Solitude, the far-distant future_

“You were a _fool_!”  Harry Potter, now known to the entity of Jor-El as Har-Zod, the lost son of General Zod and his first wife, a Magi female, shouted at the AI.  “ _You_ did this Jor-El!”  The half-Kryptonian and half-Magi orphan railed against the entity.  “ _You_ and you alone!”

“I did not kill either of your soul brothers, Har-Zod.”  Jor-El corrected him with the stoic calm of a machine that had neither emotion nor ego…supposedly.  Harry wasn’t sure who’d been fooling whom with that bit: Kal or Jor.  “My mission…”

“Was to _protect!_ ”  Harry cut him off with a sharp wave of one hand that was callused from early years of hard-labor and later years of fighting as first a figurehead, then an Auror, and last as a general in a war that was barely won…and at great price.  Har-Zod was the last remaining “son of Krypton” anymore, his trine-mates, the Kryptonian version of a destined mating which could have any number of members, had both died to save Earth long before they’d met Har-Zod, with Alexander being the rare soul that required two mates.  Kal-El, having met one of their trine-mates had lasted less than a year after Alexander died, though he’d been unaware of the reason _why_ he’d lost the will to live.  _Superman_ as he’d been known, had taken the martyr’s path, one Harry was all-too-familiar with, more out of grief from losing his beloved enemy Lex than any sense of granting salvation unto the masses.  “Your mission was to _train_ him!  Not to burden him or set a standard on him he had no fucking hope of living up to!”

“As a son of Krypton…”

“Bollocks.”  Harry snorted, crossing his arms over the sculpted chest of a grown Kryptonian that he’d gained after being “perfected” by Jor-El at the Fortress, the entity activating his until-then mostly-latent Kryptonian D.N.A.  “Krypton is gone and the Kryptonian way with it.  You were no better than the damned _Kents_ ,” he spat the word as the curse he saw it.  “With loading him full of false-ideals and an impossible standard.  Kal-El was no perfect god of a being.  He was as mortal and _fallible_ as anyone else.  As his death proved.”

Indeed, it was only after Kal-El’s death that Jor-El had sought Harry out in England where the baffled wizard had spent years watching those around him age and weaken as he himself remained as young and strong as ever.  He may not have had the full benefits of his father’s heritage – yet – at that point, but parts of it _had_ activated.  What most thought tied to his “deaths” that the hands of Voldemort had been no more than a simple genetic quirk.  Harry had agreed to go with the entity to the Fortress, and had been perfected, learning all he could like a sponge.

Right up until the subject of trines arose, and Jor-El finally, with a reluctance born of years of working with Har-Zod’s trines – or against them depending on the moment – admitted to what had happened to Kal-El and Alexander Luthor.

The latter being just as much Har-Zod’s trine as he was Kal-El’s, due to the inevitable relationship that would have occurred had they all connected whilst alive.

And had Harry not spent the better part of thirty years doped to the gills on love potions thanks to his unlamented late wife.

“You _must_ take up the mantle of Earth’s protector, regardless, Har-Zod.”  Jor-El spoke after long moments of silence, the entity scanning the creature that had been born from the husk of Harry Potter much like an Earthen butterfly from a chrysalis.  Har-Zod was very much the son of Krypton with his lean strength and burning emerald eyes.  A bit smaller than Kal-El had been both in musculature and height, but that was to be expected as of the two, Har-Zod would have likely proven to be the bearer of their young, being the one with the greatest protective instincts of the trio.

“I must do jack-shit.”  Harry shot back, pushed-down grief punctuating his words as it threatened to overcome him.  It was the enigma of Harry’s long life, how he was constantly grieving for those he’d never known: his parents – both sets now – and now his, well, _mates_ for lack of a better term, trines sounding too familial and not as encompassing as the other phrase.  “Earth can burn.  What reason do I have to save it?  So I can watch everyone else die until the sun itself burns out?”  He snorted derisively.  “Pass.”

“What if there was another way?”  Jor-El’s voice turned cunning.  “A better way?  A way that will let you fix what has happened, the wrongs that have been done?”

“Unless you’re a time-machine as well as the repository of the universe’s knowledge.”  Harry said drily without turning around, Jor-El easily shifting his holographic image onto the crystal the reluctant Kryptonian was facing.  “I don’t see _how_ you have anything to offer me to entice me to help you.”

Jor-El’s false face took on a smug cast.

“You would be surprised what the Fortress is capable of, young son of Krypton.  Will you listen to what I have to offer?”

Harry rocked back on his heels, intrigued despite himself.

“I’m listening.”

…


	2. One

** Time and Again **

**_“People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect,” says the 10th Doctor. “But actually, from a nonlinear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey ... stuff.”_ **

Writer: LokaSenna

Beta: Sif Shadowheart

**Part One: Playing Time-Lord**

**Chapter One: Cause to Effect**

_May 1, 1991; Number 4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, County Surrey, England, the United Kingdoms, Terra Sol a.k.a. Earth_

Harry Potter opened his eyes in darkness, never before happier to be in the claustrophobic, creeping dusk of the cupboard under the stairs.

Jor-El had been explicit: time travel was _anything_ but an exact science, and hurling a soul and consciousness back into a younger vessel even less so.

Moreover, there were linchpins in time: both on a universal and a personal scale, if one wished to remain in the past – reliving it, _fixing_ it – rather than simply visit it, that had to be taken into account.

It was all well and good for the Doctor with his TARDIS to jump willy-nilly through time and space, but when the technology of Krypton met with the magic of the Magi people of Terra Sol, if Har-Zod had chosen to _ignore_ the linchpins that kept the fabric of reality together…well…to borrow the words of another Doctor, one Dr. John Watson, it’d be “a bit not good.”

Every cause in nature had an effect, and his trine-mates simply wouldn’t _be_ his trine-mates if they didn’t progress through the early linchpin events that shaped and formed them…no matter how _tempting_ it might be to swoop into Lex’s life and whisk him away from his father’s cold parenting and evil nature or to wrap Kal up in his arms and tell him that he _wasn’t_ alone and more importantly, neither of them were _freaks_.

Besides which…Harry had his _own_ linchpins to work through.

He could set outside events in motion, and he _would_ once the dizziness from being flung through time and space as little more than a cloud of sentience – giving him a taste of what both Voldemort and his biological father, villains that they were and are, are both currently going through – wore off.

But this was 1991, albeit, _again_ , and Harry Potter still had trials to face and a deadly enemy to overcome before he could shed himself of his mother’s and adoptive parents’ people and leave to join his trine-mates.

Though there wasn’t a chance in _hell_ he was going to play by the rules – especially since most of those were fashioned the first time around by either Dumbledore or Voldemort.

Not when he had such a _convenient_ glimpse into what was, and is, and is yet to come.

Granted, much of that would likely change once he was done, but he didn’t see himself needing more than a few months to work things to his advantage in such a way that would get rid of the issue of Voldemort…which would hopefully work to get Dumbledore off his back.

According to what Harry already knew from his first go-around, Dumbledore currently had _zero_ idea how Tom had survived his attempt on Harry’s life, other than it being obvious Dark Arts.  _That_ doesn’t come around until his second-year, which gave him one hell of a head start since while he didn’t know _exactly_ what day it was, Jor-El had aimed for at least two months prior to his eleventh birthday when the wizarding world once more made its _claim_ on him known.  Voldemort also hadn’t had time to fashion Nagini as a horcrux, saving him one thing to hunt down.

Blinking his eyes, he pouted for a moment – unbecoming for a being of his age, but then he _was_ once again in a ten-year-old’s body…and having to deal with the same hormones and issues of any adolescent – when his vision refused to clear.  Grumbling under his breath, he felt around in the dark for his awful glasses, held together with tape, and which almost made his vision _worse_ if such a thing was even possible.  First thing after getting access to his vaults and full inheritance, Harry was getting himself to a wizarding optometrist, since it would be some time – possibly years – before he’d be able to reform the Fortress of Solitude and permanently correct his eyesight – along with the other _perks_ that came with being “perfected” and having his Kryptonian D.N.A. activated.

The main roadblock to such a venture being that – again – he was _ten_ in this body.

Ten-year-old boys didn’t generally go for jaunts to Smallville, Kansas on their own, let alone Egypt, Honduras, or China where the Stones that together made of the Crystal of Knowledge were hidden.

Glad that physical youth didn’t translate into _actual_ youth, Harry unlocked the door to his cupboard with a flick of his finger from the inside, much to the shock of his adoptive aunt and uncle who had come down the stairs to let him out to start his day of “earning his keep.”

Petunia tottered and gasped, going milk-pale at the overt display of “freakishness” on the part of her awful nephew, while her husband Vernon had almost the exact opposite reaction: his blood rushing into his already-florid face turning it an ugly shade of puce, as Vernon puffed himself up and started to lift his hand to deal what would have likely been a devastating blow to his ten-year-old body.

If, that is, if Harry hadn’t given a sigh and a roll of his too-green eyes, then with a wave of his hand silenced them and stuck them to the ceiling.

“Let’s get some things straight.”  He told them, crossing his arms over his chest and staring up at them with a gaze of dark menace that couldn’t be more out-of-place on his boyish face and in his not-yet-deepened voice.  “You don’t want me here: fine.  But you _could_ have given me away.”  He scowled fiercely as the panic in their eyes made it clear _they_ knew that _he_ knew…somehow.  “Dumbledore had no authority to place me here and if you’d objected I _would_ have been placed with a magical family or in an orphanage.  End of story.  You didn’t have to try and _stamp the freakishness_ out of me.”  He said with a sarcastic lilt and an arch of his brow at a now-dark-purple faced Vernon.  “Since clearly _that_ has worked _so well_.”  Turning his back to his “uncle” he focused solely on Petunia.  “Nor did you have to starve, neglect me, use me as a house slave, or deprive me of both affection _and_ my education.”  Hearing the thundering steps of Dudley he gave a wicked smirk at the silently-pleading face of Petunia and the moment that the baby-whale came around the corner had him silenced and stuck up between his parents.  “I don’t _actually_ blame little _Duddikins_ ,” he sneered at the boy with a wrinkle of his nose, then once again focused on Petunia.  “For any of his bullying, or his Harry-hunting or any of it.  _You_ are his parents.  It’s up to _you_ to teach him properly.  Now.”  Harry clapped his hands together with a bright smile.  “I’m going out to take care of some of my _freaky_ business.  If things go well, I’ll be out of your hair for good within the next week or two.  Until that time I’ll be living in the guest room.”  His voice was glacial but his eyes promised hellfire and brimstone if they objected, Petunia nodding fervently along with his implied demand.  “I won’t be cooking or cleaning or slaving away.  I _will_ clean up after myself and endeavor to be gone as much as possible.”

With a snap of his fingers he dropped them from the ceiling, breaking their falls – at least a little – since he wanted them bruised and _thinking_ not broken altogether.

He may – and honestly, _did_ – hate Petunia and Vernon with the fire of a thousand Sols but he couldn’t say the same for Duds.  In the end, his adopted cousin had turned out alright…even if it took an up-close meeting with a Dementor to manage it.  Hopefully, without having to deal with Harry, Duds would shape up quicker.

Well…probably not, but hope springs eternal and all that rot.

Clearing her throat, Petunia whispered: “What of school today?”

Harry shrugged.  “Tell them I’m sick.  I’m such a scrawny, underfed thing that it’s believable.  I’ll keep going after today so long as none of you.”  He glared at Vernon who was only being held in check by the sure knowledge that the day he’d feared had finally come: the freak had his powers and _wasn’t_ afraid to use them against the Dursleys.  “Do anything _stupid._ ”

Nodding meekly, Petunia wrapped her arms around her precious Dudders, ushering him into the kitchen to feed him up after his traumatic morning.

“I’ll be going with you into London today, Vernon.”  Harry said to the walrus’s back as he turned to follow his wife and child.  “You can drop me off at Charing Cross Road…I can take it from there.”

…

“What do you want?”  The goblin – Ironhammer according to his plaque – growled scowling down at the child staring up at him with hard – and shockingly cold for a child – eyes.

Cool and in control – and chanting to himself that he needed their help not their ire – Harry reached up and flipped his hair away from his infamous scar…a scar in the shape of his mother’s personal sigil, the rune Sowilo, for the Sun that Solara had been named for.

“I demand to meet with my account manager.”  He said with a firm tone and bared teeth.  “Now.”

Nodding once, Ironhammer pressed a button then snapped out an order in gobbledegook to the lesser-ranked goblin that came at his summons – who Harry was amused to see was Griphook.

The irony did not escape him, especially since part of the reason he was in Gringotts and within the traitorous goblin’s gaze was the same as the _last_ time he’d seen him: the matter of Hufflepuff’s Cup.

“Take Mr. Potter to Account Manager Nagnok.”  Ironhammer finished for the wizardling’s benefit, before going back to his ledgers, finished with the matter.

“Follow me.”  Griphook motioned for the wizard-child to follow him, more than a bit surprised when the thing did so without wasting either of their times and without filling his ears with senseless chatter as humans – magical and not – were wont to do.

With only a single sharp rap on the highly-carved door, Griphook announced their presence before ushering the wizard-child into Nagnok’s office and slamming the door shut behind him.

“Well, well.”  Nagnok sneered, one finger tapping one the desk blotter.  “The Potter Heir.  At last you’ve responded to this Bank’s attempts to contact you.”

“I’ve never received any correspondence from Gringotts in my life.”  Harry told him promptly.  Which was somewhat true.  After all, _this_ version of himself had never had any magical correspondence at this point in his body’s life.  “Nor any at all from the magical world.  Which is beside the point: I am here to take an identity test.  After which, any answers I might give to questions you have will likely make much more sense.”

Nagnok narrowed his sharp gaze.

This child didn’t speak as a child.

Moreover, a goblin’s gaze – when fixed on a target – rarely faltered or missed even the smallest of details.  And what he was seeing: the too-small form, the still-red scar, the too-large and too-old clothes; none of it made sense for what the bank had been told had happened with the placement of the Potter Heir.

Not saying another word, Nagnok merely reached into his desk and pulled out the prepared parchment and the blood-quill.

It wasn’t every day that an account manager such as him needed to perform and identity test…but it was that rare _either_.

The goblin raised an intrigued brow when without waiting for instruction, the wizard before him took up the blood quill and in the exact top-center of the prepared parchment scrawled his name in perfect – and elegant – calligraphy…and addeed some strange form of runes beneath it.

“How did you know what you were to do?”  Nagnok’s curiosity got the better of him as he watched the child rather than the parchment, which was soaking in the blood.

“Read the results.”  Harry told him with an arch look as he sat without being asked in the sole visitor’s chair.  “They’ll answer that question – and more.”

Reaching out to take the parchment which had changed from a plain cream with a blood-signature into a soft gold with black calligraphy, the goblin looked down at what it said…only to reel internally with shock, despite his visually unchanging expression.

Yes, he had to admit.  It _did_ answer many questions, even ones he hadn’t yet known he’d needed to ask.

\------------------------------------------------ **Identity Results** \------------------------------------------

 **Name:** Har-Zod (Birth); Harry James Potter (Adoptive)

 **Date of Birth:** July 31, 1980 (Of Record)

 **Age (Physical):** 10 years, 9 months, 1 day (Estimated)

 **Age (Soul/Magical/Mental):** 97 years, 3 months, 14 days (Exactly)

 **Parents (Biological):** Dru-Zod of Krypton (Sire) and Solara Peverell (Mother)

 **Parents (Adoptive):** James Charlus Potter and Lily Marie Evans-Potter (via Blood Adoption)

 **Godparents:** Jor-El of Krypton (assigned by birth parents); Sirius Orion Black III and Alice Longbottom (assigned by adoptive parents via ritual)

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“This cannot be…”  Nagnok breathed, goggling at not only the stated names and ages of the child before him – who apparently wasn’t much of a child after all – but also the results of godparentage which had grave implications for one of the biggest account holders Gringotts possessed.

“Oh, believe me.”  Harry said with no-little cynicism.  “It’s true, every word of it.  And for reasons I shouldn’t have to explain, not a single word of it can leave this office.”

“Yes.”  Nagnok shook it off, already thinking up ways to free the imprisoned Black Lord without betraying the confidence of his own major client.  It would be a coup to say the least, and worth a hefty reward from his brother, Garnok, the manager of the Black accounts.  “Of course.  Are you aware…”

“That my godfather is unjustly imprisoned?”  Harry rolled his eyes with a soft snort.  “Of course I am.  Coming back to this body has altered my voice and hormones, not my memory or ability to reason.  To that end,” he fished out a prepared letter he’d drafted whilst enduring the silent ride from Privet Drive to Charing Cross.  “This, if transferred to parchment and sent anonymously to Madam Amelia Bones, should do the trick to at least begin an inquiry regarding Sirius.”

Eyebrows arching as he read the draft letter, Nagnok had to agree.  Giving up the location of an Animagus who’d been thought dead for nearly ten years, and drawing attention to the lack of trial received by Lord Black, would most certainly rattle the cage of the honorable Lady Bones.  Whether it would do any _good_ was another question entirely.

A few taps of his finger had the missive transferred over to untraceable parchment and to the Gringotts owlery for delivery.  With the parchment used, the younger goblins who manned the owls would know to send it with one of their unmarked – but highly protected against tampering – messengers.

“Given your physical age.”  Nagnok folded his hands once more before him.  “Unless you intend to reveal to the entire magical world what you’ve done, you’ll need to remain under the guardianship of your godfather once he’s freed.  Until that time, and given your appearance, I must ask: will you be safe until then?”

“Yes.”  Harry smirked.  “Let’s just say that the hovel Dumbledore stashed me in has this morning become much more _hospitable_ than it once was.”

“Very good.”  Nagnok nodded, relaxing a bit.  There was still work to be done, but with the young – and at the same time, not-so-young – wizard’s safety ascertained they could carry on.  “What else?”

“My full inheritance: vaults, properties, everything.”  Harry waved a hand vaguely.  “I want a full accounting.  In the next years, I’m going to be working on dragging the wizarding world kicking and screaming into the modern age – or at least an approximation of it.  To do so I’ll need resources: manufacturing, distribution, etc.  As well as all of the legal and financial loopholes that go with it.”  He gave a bloodthirsty grin that was matched by his account manager who smelled gold to be made – and a lot of it.  “I have a short-list of who I want running Potter Co. while I’m at Hogwarts – but I want to keep full control as owner and CEO.”

“Rare.”  Nagnok shrugged.  “But doable.”

Harry handed over the list, which had a very infamous – and formerly gone-too-soon – werewolf at the top for the position of Chief Operating Officer of the currently stagnant Potter Co.

“Is the firm of Pucey & Brown the Potter Co. legal counsel at this time?”  Harry asked.  He knew they were when he took an interest in the original timeline – but that was years in the future.  It was entirely possible that things had changed between the then and the now.

“Yes.”  Nagnok answered after checking in his ledgers.  “They are.  With the Hon. Charles Pucey as your lead counsel.”

“Okay, that’s good.”  Harry checked one more thing off his mental checklist.  “I want them to create a company strictly in the muggle world – I want total separation between Potter Co. and this new corporation.  With what I know…”  He laughed drily and shook his head.  “Not only because of my _unique_ situation but also from my heritage, I am going to be too much in the muggle public eye to have the two companies interacting.  Potter Co. is to become completely magical except for what connections are needed to adapt tech over from the muggle side and the new corporation: Krypton Global Industries will have nothing to do with the magical aside – with one or two exception such as truly _binding_ contracts and a muggleborn Gringotts employee to serve as the public-face of Chief Financial Officer, a liaison for yourself, naturally.”

The account manager scribbled away, nodding along with a greedy grin as he heard both what was said and unsaid of his client’s plans for the future.

As an account manager, he received a flat-percentage of the Potter earnings each year, a rare honor for a goblin as most clients simply pay a fee.  The Potters believed – as goblins did – in _incentive_.  When they prospered, Nagnok prospered.  And with _this_ Potter at the helm, Nagnok was going to prosper indeed.

“Have Pucey lodge a suit against all the merchandisers, publishers, etc., who have been using my face and name to enrich themselves.”  Harry continued after giving Nagnok a chance to catch up.  “I want the next greedy idiot who gets the bright idea to profit off of me to be wetting their knickers at the price we take from those who’ve done so already.  The proceeds from that, as well as an amount that I’ll decide on once I review the accounts, will be the seed money for KGI.”  He sighed, leaning his head back against the chair as he continued to rattle off all the things that needed doing.  It was, after all, one hell of a list.  Thankfully, very little of it needed done right that second.  “Some of the properties and muggle businesses will have to be transferred over as well, I’ll figure that out after the review as well.  Everything above-board, we’ll need to create a better paper trail for me in the mundane world before some of this.  Use the “inheritance” I got from my parents following said paper trail to buy out the properties and businesses from Potter Co. for KGI etc.”  He wrinkled his nose.  “An annoying but necessary shell game.”

“A wise precaution.”  Nagnok commented, already mentally ordering his tasks, of which preparing the review of holdings was at the very top as so much would have to wait until that was finished.  “If you are going to become as high-profile as you imply.”

“You have no _idea_ , Nagnok.”  Harry chuckled a bit, thinking of the circus that followed Lex and Kal around.  “None at all.  Continuing on: in another separation, I want to _covertly_ gain at least thirty percent of the muggle company LuthorCorp.  _Very_ covertly, and spread over more than one holding so that no one, other than the two of us, are aware of just how much stock I have in that business.”  Together with Lex’s percentage – depending on how that ends up this time around –, if Nagnok manages it, would give them controlling interest in LuthorCorp…and pull at least a little of Lionel’s influence and ability to do harm away from the old bastard.  “You have ten years to manage it, Nagnok.”  He soothed the goblin who looked a bit worried – or as worried as a goblin could get over business.  “It doesn’t have to be right this second.  Another project that is a bit more pressing: two years ago, give or take, there was a major meteor strike in the small town of Smallville, Kansas.”

“The goblins are aware of it.”  Nagnok said, eyeing the wizard closely.  “Readings of the area since – both magical and mundane – have been… _odd_.”

“That would be the Kryptonite, the meteor rocks, that landed in that area.”  Harry told him simply.  “I want every single last one of them from the largest boulder to the smallest particle collected and stored by type and color in lead-lined vaults at Gringotts Metropolis.”  He leaned forward, impressing his point.  “Every, last, one – as much as possible.  With the exception of the blue Kryptonite, I want approximately half of what is recovered of that form of Kryptonite shipped here to the London branch and stored in a lead-lined vault.”

“I will send a message to the Metropolis branch immediately following our meeting, Lord Potter.”  Nagnok nodded, none of his confusion showing.  Though from the name the wizard gave the rocks, and that of his birth father, it was easy to extrapolate just _why_ the wizard wanted them collected.  “Such an endeavor will be expensive.”

“I may not have a complete accounting of my holdings yet.”  Harry rolled his eyes.  “But I’m well-aware I can afford a thousand _endeavors_ like this one.  Potters may not have Black money…but no one has Black money besides the Blacks.”

Nagnok gave an agreeing nod to that, there was a reason that only his older brother and the leader of the horde were higher ranking than Nagnok himself, and it had everything to do with Black gold.

“While they’re there.”  Harry rubbed his hand over his eyes behind his glasses, starting to get a headache from the shitty prescription and the never-ending list of things that need doing.  “I want every last shred of evidence that something _other_ than meteors came down that day collected and sealed in another vault in Metropolis.  To start with they should look up a crop duster named Eddie Cole, and a handful of scientists: Dr. Virgil Swann; and Drs. Steven Hamilton, Adam Walsh, and Donovan Jamison; though the latter group will likely have more information than the former man.  Nagnok.”  Harry’s eyes were ice-cold.  “They are to use whatever force is necessary to ensure than not even a _whisper_ of anything other than rocks came down in Smallville, save with Dr. Swann.”

“Understood.”  The goblin gave a vicious grin that was a bit wistful at the edges.  Here was a client authorizing implied force to gain an objective and he couldn’t be the one to mete it out.  Well, Potter – in this life at least – was young.  There would be plenty of time for Nagnok to have a hand in raining down blood on his enemies.  “Is there anything else, Lord Potter?”

“No…wait yes.”  Harry sighed.  It was many years ago, more than eighty now, but he couldn’t _believe_ he almost overlooked one very important detail…  “Nagnok, would the goblins know anything about how to separate a soul leech from a living vessel…”

…

Twelve hours, an intense interrogation by the leader of the goblin horde, a massively-painful (and that was coming from _Harry_ ) cleansing ritual, and the location of the horcrux in Batty-Bella’s vault later, Harry was finally able to step out into the early-evening air of Northern Horizont Alley.  Together with Southern Horizont, and east and west Vertic Alleys, they created the massive square that was the magical London district, with Diagon cutting through it and Knockurn a hidden niche in one corner.  Gringotts, naturally, had entrances leading to each.  And Horizont North was where the best healers were located, including wizarding optometrists.

While Harry had been poked and prodded and bossed around by the goblin healers, Nagnok had gotten started on Harry’s massive to-do list.  First, however, as a sign of the burgeoning respect the goblin felt for the time-traveler (for no one fiddles with time on a lark in this universe) he’d sent one of the banks’ young wizard apprentices out to Vertic East to purchase a bespelled bag that was warded to the brim with safety and anti-theft charms to carry the wizard’s folios regarding his accounts, investments, and so on.  The apprentice had also been given orders to collect a crisp set of clothes for the traveler, as the healers had had his incinerated the moment they’d left the wizard’s sight.

So it was a clean Harry, with a scar that was rapidly fading and would continue to do so with a bit of the salve the healers had given him, dressed in plain khakis with a simple cotton long-sleeved button-down in pale green that would pass as muggle, and dark brown walking boots with a leather (dragon-hide spelled to appear as leather to muggles) wallet stuffed with pound notes and a Gringotts charge card, the wallet in shiny black to match a similar bag on his shoulder that entered the establishment recommended by the rather motherly (and demanding) female goblin who’d overseen his de-Tomming.

 _Weatherby’s Fine Frames_ read the sign.  _Glasses and more since 1304._

A bell tinkled over the door, and a wizard of indeterminate age with a rather dashing mustache and sedate dark blue robes left his station adjusting a pair of omniculars behind the counter to greet what would likely be his last customer of the day.

“Hallo there lad, and welcome to Weatherby’s.”  He said with a sense of cheery routine.  “What can we do for you today?”

“I need new glasses.”  Harry sighed, taking off his old ones and showing the man who he thought might be the owner based on the way the man carried himself.  “These are rubbish.”

“Yes, yes they are.”  The salesperson – who was indeed Weatherby – sneered at the awful things before banishing them to his recycling pile, the floating quill and parchment at his side automatically adding a discount to the lad’s total based on the worth of the materials of his old glasses – which was to say, not much of one at all.  “Well, this won’t take but a moment, I’m Michael Weatherby, owner-operator, and one spell should do it to give me all the information I need to set you up with a fresh pair.”

“Thank you.”  Harry said with a nod before standing perfectly still as the proprietor waved his wand in a complex fashion he recognized from his last magical eye exam pre-time travel.

“There now.”  Weatherby tsked a bit when he saw the state of the lad’s eyes saying: “Well, this isn’t the best shape your eyes could be in – but they could be worse, could be worse.  You’re young yet, they might improve with a bit of coaching, and if not then you can have them permanently fixed once you’re of age and they’ve stopped changing.  Our young men’s selection is over there,” he pointed towards a display.  “Will you be wanting any special additions to your lenses as I prepare the glass?”

“The spell so they automatically darken and lighten according to the ambient light.”  Harry told him as he eyed the frames thoughtfully.  “And the one so if I need to transition between distance and up close they change – like muggle bi-focals.”

“Easy enough.”  Weatherby assured him, pleased that the young man seemed to have some sense and wasn’t asking for things that required a guardian’s permission.  “A couple of minutes more, have you chosen a frame?”

Harry, pleased with the slim rectangular shape and the nearly-invisible silver metal of the frames he’d been trying on, carried them over to the counter so Weatherby could summon the correct empty frame from the back and size them according to his measurements before inserting the lenses.

Fifteen minutes and ten galleons lighter, Harry walked back out of the shop and into the alley, grabbing an on-the-go dinner from one of the nearby restaurants that he noshed on as he made his way back out into muggle London to catch the train back to Surrey.

His shopping trip would have to wait until tomorrow.

After all, it wasn’t as if he didn’t know how to spell his new clothes clean…and he had a lot of reviewing to do from the reports and statements and folios Nagnok had filled his new bag with.

…

\------------------------------ **Summary of Accounts** \---------------------------------------

 **Client Name:** Harry James Potter/Har-Zod of Krypton

 **Liquid Assets:** 734,289,052 G, 12 S, 4 K (Muggle Conversion BPS: 7,342,890,520 <G only conversion> )

 **Properties:** 15,349,220 G, 17 S, 9 K (Muggle Conversion BPS: 153,492,200 <G only conversion> )

 **Investments:** 967,156 G 8 S, 5 K (Muggle Conversion BPS: 9,671,560 <G only conversion> )

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

…

Perhaps it was because Harry was used to seeing those numbers combined with the Black Estate, or maybe it was due to coming into the past from a time over eighty years in the future with inflation to go with it, but Harry handled being a muggle billionaire much, _much_ better and with more grace the second time around.

He’d already written Nagnok in the paired journals to allocate half of his liquid fortune to be his “muggle” inheritance.  The goblin had set his fellows hard at work creating the documentation to hold up in both magical and mundane courts regarding his heritage (fudged of course, to prevent him ending up a lab rat or in the madhouse) and adoption…as well as cleaning up the half-assed job Lionel Luthor had done with Kal’s and setting things up for when Harry was legally old enough to step in and keep the Kents from completely fucking up Kal’s development…and giving him a legal leg to stand on at the same time that didn’t involve dragging them into court – hopefully.

There were several properties and businesses that he owned that would work well for his plans – both for Potter Co and KGI – and he marked them for Nagnok to take care of the shell game he’d outlined.

That one of them was a beautiful old building in London was a bonus.

Just because he planned on being heavily involved in the technology game this time around didn’t mean he wanted his KGI headquarters to be in some soulless high rise.

That was definitely more Lex’s style than his own.

A memory from a barely-there series of articles he’d read when needing a break from saving the wizarding world’s collective asses had him short listing a name to take on the role of KGI’s COO…when they got to that point.

Tucking the folios away, Harry wandered into the bathroom to have a quick wash-up, his aunt scuttling out of the way like a startled crab at low tide at the sight of him.

One shower and a couple of Scourgify’s later, bag over his shoulder and wallet tucked in his pocket and Harry was off, this time thanks to his now nearly-invisible scar, calling the Knight Bus to take him to the closest entrances to Gringotts London.

…

Dropping the completed folios off, along with his non-urgent notes regarding which investments to drop and which to bump up or make altogether, Harry checked in with Nagnok regarding the status of his multifaceted _project_.

A flinty grin with bared teeth let him know that things were on-track and going according to schedule: by now the Aurors should have Peter in custody and they’ll have started the process of creating a formal inquest into Siri’s situation…starting with moving him _out_ of mother _fucking_ Azkaban.

Doing a bit of mental math, he figured he still had time to go shopping for some new muggle clothes before hitting up the library to check on a thing or two that he was fuzzy on.

Harry had _zero_ intention of remaining at Hogwarts one moment longer than necessary…and with his plans he needed a muggle degree to back up knowledge gained from the Fortress and his Kryptonian eidetic memory.

Which meant…early enrollment in a tech school… _very_ early.

Hence, needing to know what _exactly_ the protocol regarding genius prodigies was with education…especially in light of his soon-to-be-revealed abuse.

…

The next few weeks went about pretty much the way Harry and Jor-El had planned them.

Nagnok did his work – and did it well – making sure all the records were in order both for his “adoption” and that of Kal-El, along with setting up the transfers and the shell game that would completely split Harry’s inheritance into one completely mundane and the other completely magical.  A muggleborn who worked with the goblins was chosen as the public face of his Chief Financial Officer in the muggle world by the name of Marlena, followed swiftly by the COO Walter Steele, who hadn’t yet moved to Starling City to work with Queen Consolidated, allowing Harry to snatch him up…and hopefully keep him out of the poisoned talons of Moira Queen.  Walter’s first job as COO was setting up the veritable fleet of patent attorneys KGI would need, as well as a staff to furnish the R&D department in the sub-levels of KGI’s newly furnished and operational London offices.  If Walter, Marlena, or anyone else had concerns about the age of the person signing their checks, they were wise enough to keep quiet about them, though much of that was allied by his Chief Counsel Charles Pucey being the main “face” of the young genius Harry Potter.  The patent attorneys had barely signed their contracts when they were handed a stack of too-be-filed patents, the R&D department likewise flooded with designs in need of fabrication to submit along with the patents to the various patent offices.

On the magical – and currently more personal – side of things, Remus Lupin had been convinced to step into the COO spot of Potter Co on a “temporary” status mostly due to the one asking being his pack-cub who he’d not seen for nearly a decade.  Their reunion had more than a few tears, a scene revisited when Sirius was granted visiting rights at St. Mungo’s when it appeared he _was_ indeed going to be cleared of all charges and recompensed for his unlawful incarceration.  The Black Lord’s mind healer was often heard muttering dire threats, but overall by the time Harry’s “birthday” rolled around Sirius was a free man, and more than capable of taking custody of his godson.

Dumbledore had been less-than-pleased that so much had gone on – and so quickly – under his very nose while he was wrapped up in the annual mayhem of end-of-term exams.

By the time he’d been informed, Pettigrew had already been arrested, interrogated, and charged, with Sirius being brought out of Azkaban for rehabilitation before being formally cleared.

But the old coot had been mollified by Harry being raised for the first portion of his life in the muggle world, and let his further guardianship go without a fight…especially when the adoption was brought to light when Sirius had had one too many letters from the meddling bastard about the supposed “blood-wards.”  As it turned out, Sirius as James’s best friend and Alice as Lily’s, had been the only ones let in on the secret of Harry’s adoption – which was a shock to say the least to Remus.  The changes in Harry from the blood-adoption had been minimal according to the Black Lord, mainly his hair becoming a bit messier and his eyes taking on a more almond shape…and James’s poor eyesight as Harry had learned well-after his adoptive parents had passed away.

With no blood-relation, and not a legal leg to stand on, the Headmaster backed off, allowing the trio of godfather, werewolf, and godson/cub to enjoy getting to know each other – Harry finding to his own amusement but little surprise that he hadn’t gotten to know either man all that well during his first go-around.

Harry found that of the two of them, _Sirius_ with his noble-born upbringing was actually the better candidate for being his COO with his knowledge of law and finance, and Remus thankfully relinquished the position to take another as the Chief Technical Officer instead, focusing more on the R &D side of making muggle tech compatible with wizarding users and areas.

They plotted and planned – and with Sirius around by-Merlin did they _shop_ – and Harry remade an old friend as Hedwig joined them at the simple country cottage that had been Sirius and Remus’s home before the bad times of the war…another surprise.

Harry had never gotten any clue – not from either man – the first time that they were _together_ and not merely the best of friends.

Grief, he supposed, accounted for Remus’s relationship with Tonks, at least at the start of things.

Understanding at least _some_ of their godson’s ambitions, Remus researched and researched while Sirius handled taking up his seat in the Wizengamot representing both himself and Harry as the Potter Proxy, the werewolf trying to find a school of the proper caliber that would let Harry do his work via correspondence with him taking his tests during the Hogwarts breaks, which eventually led him to Magnus Academy in London, the sister-school to Excelsior Prep in the U.S.

…

“Alright, pup.”  Sirius sighed, rubbing his temples as Remus finished the last of the spell-casting.  “Run through it for me one more time.”

Harry had caved to the inevitable.  Eventually – which became sooner rather than later – he _was_ going to need help.  At least until he aged enough in this time-line to pass as a young adult.  Plus with him needing to get his OWLs and NEWTs to keep the Wizarding World off his back, for the next few years his godfathers would be able to work towards his goals while he was occupied.  Unbreakable Vows of secrecy commenced, and Sirius christened Harry with the Marauder name of “Hazard” as a play on Har-Zod.

They weren’t completely _comfortable_ with him being a time-traveler, in fact accepting him as a half-alien being was much easier for the wizards to swallow.

After all, as Hermione had told him his first go at third year, terrible things happened to wizards who meddled with time.

Still, they agreed with his cause if not with the possible effects it might have on their reality…but neither was raring to die without making it to forty _either_.

Which brought them to the current juncture.

They were in one of the R&D basement levels of KGI’s London offices, in a sterile vault area that was keyed to only allow Harry in or out.  Filling the ten-by-ten vault were what appeared to be distilling set ups…that Sirius and Remus had spelled to create a blue kryptonite-infused water, as well as one still for making a concentrated serum.  For himself, Harry was watching and working on some of the paperwork Walter had handed off for his signature regarding his latest round of patents and observing from behind a lead shield.  Though thanks to a magically-enlarged lead case, moving the blue-K to this vault from his cache in Gringotts had been easy enough…with some help from Siri and Remy to do the actual hands-on work of dealing with the blue-K.

“Kryptonite, in its various forms, is pieces of the crystal that formed much of my home-world that between our sun going supernova and being dragged through space in the gravity-pull of Kal-El’s ship have become irradiated.  Green is the most common, but _all_ of the various forms of kryptonite can have mutagenic effects on humans.”  He rattled off easily, Sirius giving a bit of a wince.

The Black Lord would likely _never_ get used to hearing who should be an eleven-year-old speak like the most bearded of academics.

Though Sirius was willing to admit, having him alive and _well_ was a much better alternative than living forever in a nearly-barren wasteland far in the future.

Or having to kill a damned basilisk at _twelve_ for Merlin’s sake!

“Blue-K can reverse the mutagenic effects of kryptonite in humans in a strong enough concentration, which is what the concentrate darts are for.”  Harry pointed to the lead-lined darts and their mini-crossbow that the goblins had forged for him…for a fee of course.  “While in a lesser concentration it can prevent and reverse – to an extent – the mania and psychosis that develops in humans after either prolonged or extreme exposure to other forms of kryptonite.”

“Right.”  Sirius blew out a breath, sharing a helpless look with his mate as Remus sealed and stacked the last crate of KGI’s “test” productions of a filtered water brand Harry named Blue K…which was actually going into production in Norway for open release later in the year…that was set to be distributed for free to every home and business in the Smallville area as a “publicity stunt” to cover the transmission of the blue-k serum to the populace.  “That doesn’t sound any better the second time around.”  He admitted, chewing on his bottom lip and sinking into Remus’s side when the werewolf joined them in the shielded sitting area.

“It’s not meant to.”  Remus commented with his dry – but irreverent – humor.  “Taking away people’s choice,” since he _knew_ that was what was bothering Sirius.  “To take the tonic or not isn’t an easy thing but, from how our cub’s described it, in a few years it’ll be like having an entire _town_ full of werewolves who shift and attack every time their emotions get high…but worse.  That’s not the sort of thing I’d really want on my conscience if I had a way – which we do – to prevent it.”

Harry nodded adding: “I’m not planning on stripping _all_ of the meta-humans, Siri.  Just a few with powers that end up being out-of-control.  Some people don’t have the excuse of psychosis, they just want the world to burn.”

“Agreed.”  Sirius said with a grim look in his eyes, remembering full-well his mother.  If it meant taking all the “filth” with her, Walburga Black would have burned the world to the ground and danced in the ashes.  “What about the people who were only visitors or have moved away?”

Harry hummed under his breath, taking out a list from one of his numerous notebooks and handing it over.  “Those are the major concerns.  Mrs. Sullivan took herself to an asylum after she had an accident with her powers.  She’ll need the concentrate.  Her husband and daughter will be fine with just the water.”  He sighed, knowing that his godfathers wouldn’t have a problem _tracking_ any of the people with magic…he just wished it wasn’t necessary for him to ask what he was about to ask.  “None of them or the other names are the problem…”

“No,” Remus arched a brow, seeing the last two names.  “That would be these two.”  He shot an arch look at the man-in-a-boy’s-body.  “I barely interacted with international muggle news when I lived muggle, but even I recognize the name of the head of LuthorCorp.  They were there?”

“Mmm.”  Harry nodded.  “Their – well one of their – mansions is in Smallville.  And I think Lionel was there to finalize the purchase of the former creamed-corn factory to turn it into a fertilizer plant.  Lex and a couple others were the strongest effected of those who were caught outside in the meteor shower.”

“And,” Sirius cocked his head to one side not unlike his Animagus form.  “These mutations usually had something to do with their greatest desire?”

“That’s what the going theory was.”  Harry shrugged.  “Lex again is one of the biggest pieces of evidence to support it: he was sickly and asthmatic, then he never got sick again and had a super-human immune system.  He hated getting teased for his bright red hair and freckles: no more red hair and skin that stayed constantly pearl-white and smooth.”  Harry’s brow wrinkled.  “Not that I ever met him to know firsthand…”  He trailed off a moment, grief weighing him down before he shook it off.  “But his dad would rave about immortality and legacies to him pretty much from the cradle…and Lex Luthor once he hit his early twenties seemed to freeze and stay ageless.”  Harry shrugged.  “Most of the others didn’t have as many or as diverse gifts, but they weren’t in space-ship central either or caught in the accompanying blast.”

“If you want, pup.”  Sirius suggested tentatively after letting the too-old-to-be-a-child in front of him wallow a bit in his thoughts.  He didn’t even want to _imagine_ going through his life without Remus only to find out _after_ Moony was dead that he was his soulmate.  “We can dose the dangerous meta-humans while we’re handing out cases of free water and sneaking it into the TyNant and scotch at the Luthor penthouse.”

“No.”  Harry shook his head, declining immediately.  “I’ll do it myself once I go to Smallville.  With the meteors cleared – as much as possible – by the goblins, I’m hoping that some of them never develop at all.”  He quirked a smile.  “Though Fate does seem to have her own way in the end.  More and more metahumans cropped up all the time before the…”  He couldn’t bring himself to say _The End_.  “Humanity it seems is destined to evolve.  This is only one way that it happens, and I want to judge for myself whether it’s going the same as last time or if the worst offenders have been fended off or diverted with the Blue-K water treatment before stripping their powers completely.”

“Your choice pup.”  Sirius smirked at him, loving the irony of his next statement when the other party is barely Hogwarts age.  “You’re the boss.”

…

Then September the First came, and Harry went back to Hogwarts.

Though this time the Hat shouted Slytherin, and the sky did not fall, he befriended the basilisk rather than killing it, and destroyed the Diadem rather than an entire room.

Quirrell, however, ended up being just as much of a useless arsehole as he was the first-time…though with a great deal less headaches involved for Harry.

….


	3. Chapter Two

** Time and Again **

_Author’s Note: Harry’s KGI in this story is basically going to be pushing to advance technology and other things without much regard for who did it in his original timeline.  For example, he launches what’s basically iTunes, the iPod, and iPhones before Apple manages it, though those will still exist they won’t be the pioneers of the new technology.  Everything he launches however, uses a Kryptonian twist on the original items, so he’s not completely appropriating others’ tech.  His overall goal being to create a world ready for what he knows is coming in regards to alien life._

_Also: the Dragon Blade used here is originally from the Charmed series._

**_In chaos theory, the butterfly effect is the sensitive dependence on initial conditions in which a small change in one state of a deterministic nonlinear system can result in large differences in a later state…_ **

**Chapter Two:**

**Wibbly-Wobbly Timey-Wimey… _Stuff_**

_August 1, 1992, Black Manor, Wiltshire_

“Do I even want to _know_ why you’re cackling, pup?”  Sirius asked his old/young godson as Harry sprinted through the renovated foyer of the Black Manor.

Over Sirius’s dead _fucking_ body would he, his mate, or their pup live in the Black Townhouse.

He’d only been there once since getting out of Azkaban, and that was only to retrieve the locket that Harry had destroyed last summer…with a very similar cackle.

Only this time Harry was carrying a thin black book and a familiar knife.

“Or why you’re running around with the trapped shade of Voldemort in one hand and a book that looks _suspiciously_ like the journal you said contains half his soul?”  Remus added with narrowed gold-tinged eyes, taking a deep breath and then stepping back.  “Gods cub, I can smell the dark magic from here.”

“Ding dong, the wizard’s dead.”  Harry chanted, admitting that he was being a _bit_ manic but not really caring at the moment.  In his hands he held the end of Moldy-Voldy.  And a full six years ahead of schedule.  Sure, he’d had to pilfer through a crushing-Ginny’s books…not to mention stab Quirriell and almost get expelled for it to trap Tom in the knife, but it had all been worth it.

And thanks to the basilisk…who strangely enough was named for Harry’s mother Solara…who was _apparently_ according to the still-living snake-Solara was Salazar Slytherin’s great-great-great-Aunt…Harry had an entire _vat_ of expressed basilisk venom to toss Voldy into.

He’d even found a copy of the massive granite cauldron Tom had used the first time around to resurrect himself…because Harry was feeling the need for a healthy portion of vindictive irony.

Sirius groaned.  “The last time you said something like that I had to go to Hogwarts to defend you from assault charges.  It was only that they couldn’t find that knife of yours that kept you from being tossed out.”

 _That knife_ being the Dragon Blade, an ancient weapon forged by the goblins and said to be empowered by Merlin himself…that Harry had used to trap Voldemort’s shade.  Being goblin-forged, it’s imminent venom-bath wouldn’t hurt it, but it _would_ destroy any trapped souls inside it…like Tommy-Boy’s.

“He has the last piece.”  Remus surmised, raising his brows.

“He has the last piece.”  Sirius sighed, nodding in agreement as they watched the young half-wizard speed down into the basement where the prepared venom-bath was waiting.  “Which considering how much destruction that arsehole wreaked, seems a bit anti-climactic.”

Remus snorted, shaking his head and walking away, calling out over his shoulder:

“Yes, because our godson _traveling back through time_ and _reliving_ decades of his life in an effort to save the world… _again_ , is anticlimactic.”

“I was just saying…”  Sirius grumbled, then trotted off to follow the others.  At the very least he wanted to watch as Harry casts the last two pieces down into their acidic demise.

…

_April 3, 1993, Excelsior Academy_

Thirteen-year-old Alexander “Lex” Luthor was leaving his final class of the day – advanced chemistry – when it happened.

Brilliant, a genius and prodigy by all accounts, Lex was due to finish his college-prep curriculum at Excelsior with an invitation to join MENSA as well as start taking college courses next year…if his parents could ever agree to a college anyway.

His parents had never had a _happy_ marriage like the kind described in books or television or movies, though Lex was more familiar with the former than the latter two mediums.  But it wasn’t until the… _incident_ when he was nine and lost his hair that things grew truly _tense_.  His father’s flagrant affair with his ailing mother’s nurse, and his pressuring his mother into having baby Julian certainly hadn’t helped things.

But at heart, for all his brilliance, Lex was still a young teen who just wanted his parents to be happy…and love him.

When the first flash went off in his face, startling and blinding him though he feared his father’s reaction to an open expression of shock being on the front page too much to let his surprise – and fear – show, Lex got the sinking feeling that any idea of playing happy family was probably out the window.

A feeling that was quickly rationalized once he stopped acting like a deer in the headlights and actually _heard_ what it was that the intrepid posse of paparazzi were shouting over each other to ask.

“Lex, Lex!  Look over here!”

“Lex, what do you think of your parents’ divorce?”

“Lex, who are you going to live with?

“Is it true…”

“Lionel had an affair?”

“That your father cheated on your mother?”

“That your mother blames your father for your… _differences_ from other children?”

Gee.  Lex thought sarcastically as he caught sight of the campus security that were coming to clear out the trash.  That one should’ve just flat-out called him a freak to his face.  It wasn’t like anyone else ever let him forget it.

“That your father kept her secluded for fear of her mental state?”

“That your father _forced_ the issue of your younger brother?”

The last implied something much more than the words themselves, and gave Lex a damn good idea of what was likely contained either in the gossip columns or the actual court documents.

Not that he knew beforehand that his mother had finally made good on her threats to leave Lionel.

Though none of what they asked addressed _his_ questions.

Such as…what was going to happen to him now?

…

_June 28, 1994; KGI Headquarters, London, England_

“What are you thinking so hard about, pup?”  Sirius asked as he strolled into Harry’s office past the time-traveler’s secretary/personal assistant Jackson Elliot, a muggleborn wizard who’d left the magical world and had pursued a career in business with a degree to that effect from Oxford.  Really, if Harry hadn’t been the CEO of two highly-successful corporations, Jackson would be ridiculously over-qualified to be Harry’s PA.

But with the booming business that adapting muggle tech to magical use that Potter Co. was enjoying and the soon-to-launch music website that KGI had engineered with music players to go with it (the website launching in the next six months and the players in the spring…and no, Harry felt zero guilt at beating Steve Jobs to the punch) Harry _needed_ a personal assistant…and a full staff to go with it.

It was only since Harry was soon to be leaving for college, having stuck to his plan and nabbed his wizarding credentials early (not hard for a hundred-year-old wizard) as well as finished his high-school education via correspondence (this one owing more to his Kryptonian eidetic memory than Harry being a great student in his first life, unless it involved Kryptonian tech) with his school of choice being the top rated technology in the world…which happened to be in Lausanne, Switzerland.

His godfathers weren’t happy about him leaving, but they couldn’t really argue it since they knew the truth of the mind and soul that was running the fourteen-year-old body.

To tell the truth, Harry had enjoyed his second adolescence with his godfathers more than he’d thought he would when he originally woke up in the past.  He’d gained a relationship with both wizards that had been there, but weakened by circumstances the first time around.  And looking at how rough and obsessive he’d been right after the time-jump, he was clearly the better for it.

Still, every now and again something would happen and the butterfly effect would come up and slap the shit out of him, the current – and first major – divergence from his original time being what he’d been brooding over when Jackson had called in reinforcements, namely Siri.

“Doctor Who.”  Harry looked up from the newspaper he’d been reading and folded it so the headline that he’d been stumped by was facing up front-and-center.  “And Fiche.”

“Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey versus the butterfly effect?”  Sirius arched a brow, aware of what Hazard was referencing, having gotten more than one lecture about time travel and chaos theory over the last three years.  “Why?”

“Because every now and then one thing will shout that everything is still much the same, while at the same time something else will be completely different.”  Harry gestured to the paper in his godfather’s hand.  “For instance, the Triwizard Tournament is still coming to Hogwarts this year.  However…”

“Luthor Divorce Final.”  Sirius read, easily placing the name as belonging to Harry’s list of people to dose with Blue-K, which had turned into a surprisingly popular brand of bottled water…though the water for public sale was minus the radioactive meteor serum.  “Lillian and Lionel Sheathe Their Claws.”

Sirius held up the paper vertically in his hand in wordless question.

“In the first go-around.”  Harry told him, a slight frown as he tried to map in his mind all the different ways this very _major_ diversion from Lex’s past/present could affect things.  “Lillian suffered from severe post-partum depression and psychosis.  She smothered her infant son, for which her older son took the blame, and committed suicide not long after.”  Grim eyes – both green and grey – locked in mutual understanding of how much that must have mentally fucked both of the older Luthor males over in the long run.  “None of which has happened this time.  Though,” he shrugged.  “Since the article goes on to explain that Lillian retained custody of Julian and is moving back to England with him, as well as having left her shares in LuthorCorp in a trust for her sons rather than allow Lionel to buy her out as part of the settlement, the same thing _has_ been accomplished.”

“Just with a lot less collateral damage.”  Sirius mused, going back to reading the article.  “For everyone involved.  You think this is a result of the blue-k treatment?”

“Has to be.”  Harry told him, still plotting inside his mind.  He _really_ needed to get the Fortress back online soon.  Jor-El would be much better at predicting the ripples that would result from this divergence than even a Kryptonian brain could.  “There’s no other cause I can think of.”

“She wasn’t in Smallville at the time.”  Sirius pointed out reasonably.

“No,” Harry agreed.  “She wasn’t.  But Lionel and Lex both _were_ and the fallout from that was one of the major strains on the two adults – as well as Lionel’s infidelity.  I imagine that took its toll on her.  So an indirect effect on her from the blue-k: Lionel being less mentally corroded from the radiation exposure leading to a less-stressed and happier Lillian and this new chain of events.”

“And on the world turns.”  Sirius reminded him gently, netting himself a brilliant smile from his pup for his efforts.

…

_Headlines: 1994-1996_

The Daily Prophet – August 1st, 1994:

** Potter Heir OWL and NEWT results! **

** Genius Scion of the Ancient Peverells Leaves Wizarding World for Muggle Technology! **

** Read the Full Expose… **

**...**

Wired Cover – November 1994:

** Krypton Global Industries and the Future of Personal Music: **

** The Patents that made the Kry-Go Portable Music Player Possible **

** And **

** Possible Future Applications of KGI’s smaller, lighter, and faster processors and chip designs, an Opinion discussion panel featuring Wayne Enterprises’ own Lucius Fox **

**…**

The Inquisitor – December 24, 1994:

** Loathsome Lionel gets Served: **

** Paternity Hearing Underway for Luthor! **

** The scandalous affair between Nurse and Husband that shattered a Dynasty! **

** Plus: The College decision – Why _Did_ genius Lex pick Princeton? **

** Parental Pressure, or is the Luthor Heir hiding from his future in Metropolis? **

…

Popular Science March 1995:

** New Tech Issue **

** Featuring: **

** Nokia’s new smaller, more convenient phone **

** KGI’s Kry-Go portable music player: No CD’s required! **

** And so much more! **

…

Wall Street Journal – December 1, 1995:

** KGI holds steady under the management of COO Walter Steele: **

** Will the young inventor, CEO, and owner ever choose to go public? **

…

People Magazine – June 1995:

** Young, Brilliant, and Wealthy: **

** Our list of the hottest young, smart, and rich bachelors around the world! **

** Including: **

** Wayne Enterprises Heir Bruce Wayne, **

** KGI Owner/CEO Harry Potter **

** Queen Consolidated’s own Oliver Queen **

** And **

** LuthorCorp’s Heir Alexander “Lex” Luthor **

…

The Daily Planet – March 1996:

** A World in Mourning: **

** In Memoriam: Lillian Luthor **

…

_March 13, 1996; Bellamy Family Estate, Oxfordshire, England_

“Where are _my sons?!_ ”

The shout broke the reverent air of mourning that had pervaded the English estate and home of the late Lillian Luthor neé Bellamy, and announced the presence of her ex-husband without fanfare.

After her divorce; ailing, heartsick, and depressed, Lillian had returned to her English home bringing with her, her toddler-son Julian and her long-time friend and Julian’s main caregiver and nanny due to her own poor health Pamela Jenkins.

Pamela had originally been Lex’s nanny, but as the now-sixteen-year-old young man was away much of the year at Princeton gaining his bachelor degrees in both business and bio-chemical engineering, he had little need for a nanny anymore.  Which wasn’t to say that he didn’t have a minder of sorts, Lionel may have conceded on his son’s attendance at a school so far outside of his immediate control, but he didn’t give it up altogether, especially in the wake of his ex-wife’s far-too-successful breaking of his control and taking their second child with her.  Enrique had been chosen, however, by Lillian not Lionel, and served as part-butler and part-handler for the penthouse apartment that Lex called home in New Jersey.

Lex was on-track to graduate next year from Princeton, a full year early, and Lionel had already begun making noise about him pursuing his Masters in Business Administration or MBA at Metropolis University instead of continuing at Princeton the way Lex would have preferred or attending Oxford as Lillian desired.

The latter two options now seemed to be moot points, as Lex would only be seventeen next year, and with his mother’s passing Lionel was certain to reassert his control over his wayward offspring.

Lillian living or not, Lex had reveled in the nominal freedom his exodus from both Excelsior and Metropolis had afforded him, ending up on the front page of gossip rags more often than not in the last few years, making his early double-grad status more shocking than not.

But Lex was nothing if not focused and able to multitask, and the very _idea_ of his work suffering because of how he chose to play was anathema to him, a trait he’d very much inherited from his father.

At least in one respect Lex did _not_ resemble Lionel: he didn’t have an unending string of affairs with bastard children popping up every few years, though even Lex had to admit that not _all_ of them ended up being Lionel’s, the fact remained that not one soul would have been surprised if they all had been, least of all his ex-wife and oldest son.

Lionel hadn’t stepped foot on the Bellamy estate once in the three years following his wife’s departure from his life and control, not even to see his youngest son who Lillian had used not a small amount of guile and blackmail to retain full-custody over.

Rather than have some extremely _damaging_ information come to light, and not yet willing to kill his own wife, who he loved in his way, Lionel had conceded – but not without spilling his own share of spousal heart-blood in the process.

Now he’d come to England for the first time in years, and only to take back control of his heirs.

But first the will reading had to be gotten through, the leonine man with his wild mane of hair at least having the respect to wait to arrive until Lillian had been respectfully interred in the family crypt.

And for once, without his endless string of vapid – and too young – women hanging off of his arm.

Lionel was morally bankrupt, not stupid after all.

Throwing his affairs in the face of Lillian’s friends and few remaining family members would be nothing less than waving a red flag in front of a herd of bulls.  He had no desire to be stuck in England for the time it would take for Lillian’s uncle to drag him through the courts to assert his rights over his children.  And James was stubborn – and vindictive – enough to force the matter if Lionel pissed him off.

“Mister Luthor.”  Fulkirk, the Bellamy family’s implacable butler who Lex remembered from all through his childhood as having never aged beyond the stern mien and snow-white hair, his posture never stooping and his eyes remaining as sharp as ever, greeted Lionel as he stormed through the doors of the manor house with only an icy arch of a brow.  “The Will Reading of Mistress Lillian is in Master James’s study.  Young Master Alexander is already there and waiting, along with the rest of those expected.”

Lionel held in a snort, knowing far-too-well the sharp edge of Fulkirk’s tongue.

Even the indomitable head of LuthorCorp had a healthy respect for the powers of a British butler and the network of connections they possessed.

Unless Lionel wanted to find himself in desperate need of good help for all of his homes, he’d keep a moderately civil tongue in his head in regards to Fulkirk, as he’d learned once to his own chagrin, having been forced previously to suffer through a full quarter of sub-par help before Fulkirk had lifted his ban.

“And Julian?”

“Young Master Julian remains in his rooms with Mrs. Fulkirk.”  The butler and housekeeper having been married for some forty years at this point.  “Would you like me to show you the way to the study, Mister Luthor?”

“No, thank you Fulkirk.”  Lionel conceded that he wouldn’t be allowed near Julian, who he’d only seen twice in the years since Lillian took him off to England, both fly-by visits when business took Lionel to London and Lillian deigned to bring his son up from the country.  He was five years old now, and looked so much like a younger Lex that it was beyond striking, only instead of hair in the bright red of Lillian, he’d inherited Lionel’s own dark brown locks.  “I know the way.”

“Very good, Mister Luthor.”  Fulkirk folded his hands in front of him with a sharp nod, then turned crisply to venture up the hidden inner-stair to take up post outside Young Master Julian’s rooms.  It wouldn’t do to allow even the _appearance_ of an opportunity for Luthor to take advantage of, after all.  That he referred to him at all times as Mister Luthor and not even forbearing to use _sir_ was a sharp indicator of the level of respect Lionel was given within this house – which is to say, none at all.  “Good day.”

…

Lex looked up, the only sign of his grief as well as his erratic and tumultuous emotions that threatened to drown him showing in the reddish rim and tint marring his pale blue-grey eyes, as the door swung open with the patent verve that marked any entrance by his father.

The other beneficiaries, mourning his mother or otherwise, had been hissing among themselves over Lionel’s unseemly bellowing entrance to the estate.  All save the few most directly affected, both by Lillian’s death and Lionel’s arrival: their son Lex, his uncle James, and Pamela; all of whom remained quietly composed and stoic as the few representatives of the charities and causes that Lillian had supported in life and remembered in death gossiped among themselves.  Outside of a knowing glace shared by Pamela and James, there was no reaction from that quarter when Lionel entered James’s study, save for Lex’s own searching glance at his father, the younger Luthor trying to gauge just how big of a scene they were in for.

Hopefully, Lillian’s solicitor who had taken up position behind James’s own desk would have the wherewithal to disseminate the charitable bequests before getting into what – if he knew anything of his parents – was certain to be an explosive reading best done in private.

“James.”

“Lionel.”

“Pamela.”

“Lionel.”

His father nodded politely to both of the main barriers between himself and his sons, then made a grand show of leaning down to wordlessly embrace Lex himself before seating himself front-and-center in the empty seat to Lex’s left, leaving Lex bracketed by his great-uncle on one side and his father on the other with Pamela on James’s right.

Taking that as his cue, Marius Redfield, Lillian’s long-time solicitor and an old friend of James linked his hands before him and began.

“Following the wishes of the late Mrs. Bellamy-Luthor, we will begin with the bequests to various charities, after which, whose representatives will need to take their leave and allow the _private_ matters of family to proceed.”

At the stern words of implied censure from the late-middle-aged man, said representatives shrunk down in their seats, getting up one by one to depart as Redfield rattled off the list of a dozen or so bequests Lillian had left behind to a variety of groups, mostly to do with either children or medical research.

“Now that the gossipmongers have departed.”  Marius said drily, leaning back a bit and eyeing the sure-to-explode Lionel.  “I would like to impress upon _all_ of you that Lillian’s last will and testament is ironclad and has _already_ been filed for the probate courts to review.”  He arched a brow and directed the next to Lionel along.  “There is no way in either heaven _or_ earth for it to be changed or tampered with in any way.  To that end –,” he glanced at James in prompting.  Marius was _not_ going to be the messenger of _that_ bit of machination on the part of the Bellamy family.

“Lionel.”  James leaned forward and shifted in his chair to face his niece’s dreadful choice of spouse head-on.  “As you are aware, upon your divorce and as part of your agreement with my niece, you signed away all parental and custodial rights to Julian.”

Lionel waved a hand dismissively.  “As we are all too aware, James, Lillian is _dead_.  That agreement dies with her.  My sons are _my_ sons again.”

“Not quite.”  James smirked, enjoying the fury building behind Lionel’s pleasant façade.  Though he was sorry for the agitation and anxiety that was plain to see crossing Lex’s face.  “You see, you signed away your rights.  Completely.”

“And now that Lillian is gone, I can sue to have them _back_ , no matter what _arrangements_ she might have made.”  Lionel’s voice turned silky with threat, focusing – somewhat rightly – on Pamela.

“No, you can’t.”  James shot back, the smirk a full-on gloat.  “Lillian wanted you to have custody of Julian back over her dead body.  Three weeks ago his adoption was final.  As far as the law is concerned, Julian is now _fully_ a Bellamy, _my_ son and Heir.”

“WHAT!”  Twin voices exploded, one much younger than the other, Lex and Lionel sharing a moment of true agreement between them in their shock.

“She couldn’t _do_ that!”  Lionel continued as Lex watched him jump to his feet and slam his hands down on the massive desk, confronting the lawyer rather than the patriarch.  “That _can’t_ be legal!  Julian is my _son!_ ”

“Not anymore.”  Marius told him simply.  “In truth – not since you signed away your rights three years ago.  Lillian had every right to give him up to a total stranger or even the state or an agency, let alone to a family member.  Everything is above-board, and _ironclad_ , as previously stated.”

“And Lionel.”  James told him, flicking away an invisible speck of dust.  “If you’ve _ideas_ swirling in that cesspit you call a mind, let me assure you now that _contingencies_ are in place.  You could wipe all of England off the map and _still_ not gain custody of Julian.  He is my Heir in truth, and I’m _going_ to keep him.”

Seething, Lionel paced before the massive desk.

“As far as Lillian’s remaining estate.”  Marius began again, leaving the matter of Julian as settled…at least for the moment.  “It was left in the majority to Alexander, to be held in a trust jointly administered by her uncle James and one Pamela Jenkins until his adulthood.  Her stock in LuthorCorp will still revert to Alexander’s control upon his eighteenth birthday, along with the Smallville estate…”

“ _My_ family’s home.”  Lionel muttered in disgust.  Damn all intelligent – and cunning – women to the devil.  He’d stick to vapid sugarbabies from now on, none of _them_ had ever cost him even a fraction of what his divorce had – and apparently with Julian’s adoption still _was_ costing him.

Ignoring Lionel, Marius carried on.

“And a third of his cash-trust.  The remainder of her investment portfolio and the final two-thirds of her fluid estate will revert to Alexander’s control upon his twenty-first birthday.”

“And Julian?”  Lex asked.  From the sound of things, Mother had left him everything.  He honestly didn’t know what else there was for his baby brother.  Though he supposed as the Bellamy Heir, there wasn’t much Julian would _need_ an inheritance from Lillian for.

“Her shares in the Bellamy family concerns.”  Marius told him in a much gentler tone than he’d used previously, well aware of how much Alexander was hurting in his grief – having to deal with the issue of Lionel and Julian hadn’t helped matters in the least.  “As well as a small estate in Roxboroughshire and a small cash inheritance – around a million dollars, mostly to provide for the estate’s upkeep until he has access to his Bellamy trust at twenty-one.”

Lex arched a brow at his great-uncle in wordless question.

“He won’t have full access to the Bellamy fortune until my passing.”  James assured him.  “But the trust is more than generous, if not _quite_ as massive as your own.”

Lionel snorted.  That was due to the timing of Julian’s birth being after the demise of his grandparents, nothing more.  Lionel’s parents had left provision for Lionel only having a single heir, not two.  Though, he thought now that was rather appropriate since the damned Bellamy patriarch had _stolen_ his son.

“At least I only have to deal with you for another two years.”  Lionel hissed in an aside to James, knowing full-well that the man wasn’t about to let another sit on the LuthorCorp board as Lex’s proxy.

“Oh Lionel.”  James chuckled.  “I always _have_ appreciated your unrelenting _optimism_ that things will go your way…”

…

_KGI London Headquarters, June 1997_

“I really wish you’d agree to launch the new cellular project a year early, Haz.”  Walter Steele told his young boss as they went over the plans for the summer launches and other projects that were going on worldwide under the KGI aegis – even if some of them were buried under a dozen subsidiaries making it nearly impossible to track back to Krypton Global Industries and Harry “Hazard” Potter, its young CEO and chief inventor/think-tank.  “We have the telecom platform already online, and our rugged laptop line is already launching with built-in wifi capabilities via satellite.  Why not go ahead with the phones as well?”

“Timing.”  Harry told him as he tore through a stack of documents that needed his signature.  Walter was well used to the rapid rate his brain worked and processed so didn’t even bat an eye, though the older Englishman _had_ been very taken aback the first time he saw Harry in action for himself.  It certainly explained how the lad kept track of a global corporation and attended college at the same time.  “I don’t want to glut the market with new tech all at once.  Breadcrumbs, Walter, they need breadcrumbs, else too much attention might be drawn to how we’re accomplishing all that we are and have done in the past.”

“A natural progression, yes.”  Walter sighed.  “Phones next year?”

“Mmm.”  Harry nodded absently.  “Tablets the year after.  And starting next summer I’ll officially step out and start doing the tech shows myself, show the man behind the myth.”

“With the way the gossip rags go on about you with little to feed them.”  Walter chuckled, rising to go back to his own office.  He had a project ongoing in their clean-energy department that needed a bit of a nudge.  “I’m sure it will be something to see at that.”

“Razzle dazzle, Walter.”  Harry smiled self-deprecatingly.  “Window dressing.  When they think KGI they think of a young CEO and his flashy – if useful and innovative – toys.  They don’t think to connect me or _us_ to the dozens and dozens of minor companies all over the world that are leading the way in clean energy or organic and sustainable agriculture and aquaculture or urban renewal.  All they can see are the diamonds on my Rolex, the paintjob on my Ducati, and the numbers in my bank account – and that’s the way I want it.”

“Ah to be young, brilliant, and handsome.”  Walter heaved a mock-sigh, chuckling all the way out of the massive office that looked like a cross between a mad-inventor’s lair and the flash-and-dash expected from a wealthy young man with the world metaphorically at his fingertips.  “Such a burden, I’m sure…”

Harry’s chuckle was much less humorous and much more bitterness.

“If you only knew, Walter.”  Harry told the air, thinking of a barren planet and a too-full cemetery.  “If you only knew…”

…

 


	4. Chapter 3

** Time and Again **

_Author’s Note: We’re still in pre-series here, so lots of time skips still going on.  Also, I’m changing the initial meeting between Clark and Lex to take place a year later than in the series, for reasons that’ll be explained as we go.  But this is the last groundwork chapter!_

**Chapter Three: Chaos Theory**

_Kawatche Caves, Kansas; July 1, 1998_

The Metropolis Tech-Con was in full swing, and the public was even more in love with KGI’s Kry-Phone than they’d been with its predecessors: the Kry-Go portable music player, Krypton Music Service Kry-Tunes, and the various ruggedized laptops and sat-phones that were geared more towards government platforms and industrial markets.  It featured built-in access to the new wifi phenomenon for wireless internet – if you could find a hotspot – as well as internet via the cellular service, had a proprietary operating system, built-in access to the Kry-Tunes library, and wonder of wonders: a full-color touchscreen display.  Officially, it was years ahead of anything else on the market for public use, and prohibitively expensive…which meant that naturally everyone wanted one.  Unofficially, Harry knew that Steve Jobs was cursing his ass up on side and down the other, as KGI had consistently beaten their releases of similar tech by anywhere from three years to in the case of the Kry-Phone fifteen years.

He felt bad about it, a little, but since his items weren’t total copies of the other company’s innovations in the original timeline, and had been seriously overhauled with his knowledge of Kryptonian tech, he didn’t feel _that_ bad…and made up for it with a hefty investment into the companies that he knew his tech releases were impacting to soothe his conscience.

Honestly, at the rate other companies were trying to cut deals for access to his patented microchips and other innovations that were _entirely_ Kryptonian tech adapted to Terra, as well as trying to keep up with him, he was pushing the tech race harder and faster than it had gone in his first time.

Which was a secondary goal behind making dead _certain_ that he had the resources to fight some of the coming challenges, such as Lionel Luthor.

Harry and Walter had stolen the show as the headliners for the Tech-Con, and Harry was due to give the closing address at the end of the conference on Friday the Third, just before the U.S.’s annual Independence Day celebrations.

He was also in Kansas to begin the major divergence from his first time – the first intentional one anyway – raising the Fortress and beginning Kal-El’s training.

Harry himself should – and would – have as limited contact with Kal-El as possible, not wanting to imprint himself on the currently-twelve-year-old boy.  But Remus would be happy to have another student to teach, the werewolf missing being an educator despite the fulfillment and enjoyment he got from his work adapting muggle tech to magical use for Potter Co.  Kal-El would learn quickly once his heritage was revealed and he now longer had to hide himself, so getting an education through correspondence with Magnus Academy would be even easier for him than it had been for Harry as there would be less secrecy involved.  Well, less secrecy after a fashion anyway.

In fact, the main problem with Kal-El _wasn’t_ the need for his training before the world goes to hell, it was his adoptive parents – specifically, his prejudiced father and manipulative mother who had unwittingly – or perhaps even _intentionally_ – engendered such a high-degree of self-loathing in Kal-El that it took _years_ for him to live up to his potential…and even then he only did so grudgingly and without fully blossoming before his death.

Of course, much if not all of Harry’s information came from second-hand accounts from Jor-El and the AI was more than open about the fact that it didn’t understand humans and their interactions well at all.

He _might_ be being too hard on the Kents, after all, raising a literal alien-child couldn’t have been easy.

But Harry’s own jaded experiences with people obsessed with the “normal” ideal didn’t give him much hope for his long-distance read of the situation being very, very wrong.

When he wasn’t learning more about Terran-technology at Lausanne, or working with Sirius or Walter to expand Potter Co. and KGI, Harry had been working on his major first-step to a real change to prevent his original future from ever coming into fruition:

Creating the Fortress of Solitude, though he supposed since it wasn’t done by Kal this time he _could_ rename it…he just didn’t see the point as the Repository of Kryptonian Knowledge while being more accurate certainly wasn’t any less of a mouthful.

If nothing else was accomplished by Harry uniting the Stones of Power and bringing the Fortress to life, preventing Lana Lang from inadvertently reactivating Brainiac was of paramount importance.

Whether something _else_ ended up summoning the construct or not, Harry couldn’t predict, but _that_ event was one he could prevent.

Keeping Brainiac and his unlamented father far from Earth, either floating aimlessly through space or trapped in the Phantom Zone was his greatest concern after uniting with his Trine.

So much pain and desolation came from Jor-El sending so many powerful – and dangerous – objects to Earth that Harry had spent a massive chunk of time hunting them down and sealing them away in lead-lined cases and vaults, surrounding them with kryptonite, and warding them to hell and back, among them artifacts like the Orb, the Book of Rao, and the Starblade, all locked up in different locations courtesy of his favorite goblin banks who for a fee had zero problem lining vaults with meteor rocks and lead before sealing them shut both with his tech and magic and their own.

Somethings were never meant to be rediscovered, while others should have never been made in the first place.

The Kawatche caves, with their ruddy fucking prophecy was another such thing that Harry wouldn’t allow to be rediscovered.  He’d warded it all to hell and back, sealing it with both magic and the earth itself, reinforcing all the walls and both the cave system floor and ceiling.  There wouldn’t be any unfortunates falling into it or nosy businessmen trying to find the key to immortality in it, not this time.

Honestly, if Harry didn’t need the alter to create the portal to the Artic and begin the formation of the Fortress, he would’ve just blasted the place to Mars and back, instead – since needs-must – he’d contented himself with a single wave of his wand wiping the walls clean of the damned petroglyphs that had caused – surprise surprise – nothing but pain, grief, and heartache.

If Harry had been asked to sum up the years when he’d been stuck in England in his first time instead of helping his trine come together that’s exactly how he’d describe how Kal and Lex had spent them: nothing but pain, grief, and heartache.

Setting down the three-compartment lead case on the cave floor, Harry braced himself before opening each in turn, setting first the Stone for Air, then Water, then Fire into place and watching with no little awe – almost despite himself – as they reformed into the Crystal of Knowledge which shone temptingly within reach.

Smirking, Harry rolled his eyes at the icy-blue stone that pulsed with power, then reached out and let it suck him through space and into the ice-and-bitter-cold of the Arctic Circle.

…

_Arctic Circle_

Barely feeling the cold and chill of the wind thanks to judicious planning in the form of heating charms, Harry glared out from narrowed lids as the Summer sun which shone so brightly during this time of year threatened to blind him.  It may have been night already in Kansas, but the sun didn’t set on the Circle in July, so the best he could hope for was a pale purple-blue at some point when the sun lowered to hover near the horizon, even if it never dipped below it.  The Crystal pulsed in his hand, giving off a sense of urgency.

“Yeah, yeah.”  He sighed, biting back another eye-roll by the skin of his teeth.  “You know, for an AI that doesn’t age, you certainly could use some work on your patience.”

With that, Harry tossed the Crystal into the snow, and it took it from there, the massive pillars of crystal and ice began to rise upwards into the sky.

“I’m glad you come with built-in camouflage.”  He commented, crossing his arms over his chest and eyeing the massive structure as it rose before him, paying little attention as the ice-pack shook underfoot.  “Otherwise this would be a _bitch_ to hide from both muggles and magicals.”

Turning on his heel, Harry disappeared and reappeared in an instant from standing far off from the Fortress to crouching atop the highest point.  Cocking his head, he stared down into the Fortress from above, trying to get a sense if the technology that protected the Fortress from detection had changed between its first creation and when Harry encountered it in his first life.  Giving it up after a moment with a sigh, knowing that like most tech from Krypton, it remained somehow inflexible while also being highly adaptable.  It likely _could_ change if needed…it just wouldn’t like it much and if it was anything like the AI that called it home, there would be an insufferable amount of petulance to go along with it.

Jumping down, Harry landed easily upon the center dais, easily picking to the control crystal and taking hold of it, activating the central console and the AI.

A flicker passed over him as the AI appeared, a familiar face in a world that was much younger than the first time they’d met.

“Hello, Jor-El.”  Harry arched a brow at the frowning AI, who’d been expecting to see his son, not a too-familiar stranger.  “It’s been a long time.”

“Has it?”  Jor-El responded as the scan reported its findings.  Half-Kryptonian and Half-Magi.  There was only _one_ being that Jor-El knew of with that genetic coding, and he’d died many years before in the fall of Kandor.  “Har-Zod?”

“Well.”  Harry gave a quirk of his mouth.  “Longer for you than for me.  To save time,” and what would no doubt have been many _many_ arguments.  “I am going to allow the Fortress to access my memories – all of them.”

“You are not a construct.”  Jor-El responded some minutes later, allowing the center console to rise at last for Harry to access.

Harry could’ve overwritten it if Jor-El hadn’t willingly opened up the console to him, but it would’ve taken more time than he wanted to spend.  They had too much to do before Harry had Kal brought to the Fortress for training to waste it dickering.  As it was, with over a century’s worth of memories, it would take likely an hour or more for the Fortress to sort and download them all, since it had no need of mundane memories like toileting and eating.  The brain never forgot a single moment, it just prioritized which moments to make consciously available.  Someone – like a son of Krypton – with an eidetic or photographic memory simply was able to access _more_ of their stored memories instead of less.

“No, that I’m not.”  Harry agreed easily as he moved to place his hands in the proper slots and allow the Fortress into his mind.  “This wouldn’t be painful if I was…so there’s that to show me I’m still alive after all...”

…

Sometime later, once the Fortress and Jor-El had examined his memories and decided that Harry wasn’t likely to follow in his father’s footsteps – and that the original way that Jor-El had planned to approach his _own_ son was doomed to nothing but failure – the AI agreed to make sure everything Harry had put into place was truly secure from a computer-aspect.

No one, not Lionel or Brainiac or even Chloe Sullivan, whether friend or foe or somewhere in between would find so much as a single loose-end once the best, and most advanced, computer system on the planet was through.

Jor-El needed a bit of time to completely thread himself through the world’s mainframes, but once he was done there wouldn’t be so much as a single server outside of his reach…unless that server had someone like Harry on their side to protect it, as Harry had in fact done with quite of few of his systems.  He and Jor-El might have come to an accord before he was sent into the past, and the AI might be playing along now, but Harry’d been schooled entirely too well on some of the construct’s early manipulations and out-right crimes against its creator’s child for him to not prepare countermeasures against the machine.  The original Jor-El had made more than one mistake by giving his creation all of his memories and intellect but none of his tempering from regret or pain.  It had knowledge but no wisdom, and a sense of hubris that went far beyond being a fatal flaw for itself to the point of infecting almost every interaction with the taint of it.

Harry was willing to work with the damn thing but he’d never trust it.

Not with his _own_ life let alone that of Kal-El.

“My sensors tell me that you have not yet accessed your full Kryptonian inheritance.”  Jor-El said abruptly as they finished their plans for Kal’s training.  It would be broken up in pieces so Kal could undergo the illusion of “boarding school” for the small-town minds who kept abreast of things in his adoptive parents’ home town.  There wouldn’t be any unexplained absences or running away this time, putting him in harm’s way.  Not the least of which being due to there being no place on earth Kal would be able to hide once Harry got a lock on him, let alone Jor-El.  “You are in need of perfecting to reach your full potential.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”  Harry groaned, rubbing his hands over his face.  “How long do your scans tell you it’ll take this time?”

“You have less damage in this timeline.”  A mechanical pinging sounded for a moment.  “Two weeks, perhaps less.  Which is a fifty-percent decrease from your original treatments in the original timeline.”

“Two weeks.”  Harry grimaced.  “I don’t have time for that right now.  I’m due to go make arrangements with the Kents in two days.”

“And then you can return.”  Jor-El said resolutely.  “Kal-El is to spend the rest of the summer with his adoptive guardians, you can return after you’ve made arrangement and undergo the process to unlock your full potential before he arrives in the fall.  This is not a suggestion Har-Zod: it is a necessity.”

_…_

_“It is of great importance whether a youth in his tender years hears any act praised or censured; this necessarily makes a lasting impression upon his mind, and becomes afterwards the rule of his life for all time.”_

_\- Niccolo Machiavelli_

_…_

_The Kent Farm, Smallville, Kansas; July 3, 1998_

The day the sky fell and the bottom dropped out of the happy little world the Kents had isolated themselves in was a bright and beautiful summer day without a single cloud in the sky.

Their son – adopted, though no one was aware of just where from…something even the Kents were at sea themselves over – Clark was over at his friend Pete’s house for a rare unsupervised visit.

Clark was twelve – or so they estimated – and they trusted him enough to allow him to play with other children.  For the last three years they’d been slowly easing on the restrictions they’d bound up their son and his behavior with, believing that he was finally old enough to understand the severity of his… _differences_.  They’d even decided that if the summer passed without incident that Clark could be allowed to attend public school with the other area kids instead of being stuck on the farm all-day every-day with his parents to watch and make sure he didn’t hurt anyone or give away his secret.  Jonathon and Martha Kent had lived the last nine years with the constant fear and worry over Clark being pegged as _different_.

Especially by those with the power to _do_ something about it like the government…or Lionel Luthor who had _arranged_ their adoption papers.

Thankfully at the time, Luthor had been too wrapped up in his own drama over his son’s exposure to the meteor shower radiation to pry _too_ deeply into the strange child that had ridden side-by-side with his own to the hospital in the Kent’s farm truck.

Lionel had finished his business in town, screwed over more than a dozen of Jonathon’s friends and neighbors with his unwilling assistance as “payment” for fixing Clark’s papers, and then blew back out of town with his radiation-exposed son in tow, never to look back on the town for longer than a spot-check on his new fertilizer plant took.

And good riddance to him.

However, on this day the devil wasn’t riding a pale horse or for once carrying the last name Luthor.

Instead, he was driven by a chauffeur in the latest model of Bentley, with a sandy-haired man who boasted a set of impressive facial scars that appeared as if he’d been clawed, and a slick-looking man with grey hair in a suit that cost the earth who the Kents easily pegged as a lawyer from a dozen yards away.

Worse, once they got closer, it was obvious that this new devil – who Martha at least recognized from the papers – had been accompanied by an old one in the form of Martha’s father William Clark who had cut ties with his only child when she chose to marry far beneath her to a farm boy, not even having the _decency_ to marry new money if she was going to go dumpster-diving.

The trio crossed the sunbaked yard at an easy pace, William having no problem keeping up with his younger companions.

“Martha, Jonathon.”  William took the lead, exchanging cold nods with his daughter and son-in-law.  “This is…”

“Hazard Potter.”  Jonathon interrupted, eyeing the expensive designer jeans and silk shirt, the opaque sunglasses that probably cost the earth and the Bentley with the engine still running to keep the driver cool from the AC in the Kansas summer heat.  “Yeah, we get the news down here in Smallville, William.”

“And Mr. Potter.”  William carried on without reaction to his boorish son-in-law’s interruption.  “These are the Kents.  Jonathon, Martha, I am here as a professional courtesy to one of my firm’s sister-firms overseas.  It seems Mr. Potter and his companion Mr. Lupin have important business to discuss…”

Jonathon opened his mouth for another interruption, likely in preparation to send out a scathing response to whatever “business” someone like Harry “Hazard” Potter might have with _honest_ small-town folk like them, the implication being that since Potter had money and a successful corporation he was innately and automatically a crook and a liar, only to be cut off in turn when one tanned, lithe, hand reached up and plucked off a pair of Ray-Ban mirrored aviators, revealing eyes in an unworldly bright green.

“Our business,” his smooth and crisp British accent sliced through the mutual contempt floating between the in-laws, as Martha’s wide-eyes took in the abnormally beautiful features that if anything had been downplayed by the media.  “Has to do with your _adopted_ son, Mr. Kent.  And best spoken of in the privacy of your home…” He smirked.  “Unless, perhaps, the _storm cellar_ might be a better locale?”

…

Harry couldn’t help but snicker a bit under his breath as Jonathon Kent – who’d done one of the best cases of brainwashing ever on a Kryptonian with his adopted son in the original timeline – got a horrified look on his face when he realized that Harry wasn’t even close to bluffing and darted at a run for the aforementioned storm cellar.

William took charge of his shocked daughter, gently taking her arm after sharing a smirk with Harry over the prank on his son-in-law, ushering into her kitchen and seated her with care at her table.

With only a moderately-disapproving look at his cub, Remus knowing full-well Harry’s _issues_ with the Kents – and old mind-and-soul or not, he _was_ dealing with the demands of a eighteen-year-old’s physiology – the werewolf bustled around the kitchen, collecting glasses to go with the pitcher of iced sun-tea he’d found in the refrigerator, then going a step further and plating up some nibbles in the form of what smelled to be truly excellent cookies.

Everyone had taken their places, leaving the spot beside Martha empty with Harry directly across from _her_ rather than the missing _-him_ , with William and Remus flanking him.

William Clark wasn’t fully-aware of what was going on, but he knew enough to know _not_ to ask, in addition to the very (magically though of that he _was_ truly unaware) binding contract he’d had to sign in order to accompany Potter and Lupin to see his daughter – which had been a professional favor from the English firm, one of them could have just as easily accompanied Potter instead.

Martha startled out of her daze while the others were unaffected at Jonathon’s slamming-doors and stomping-feet, fists-clenched and teeth-bared charge into the kitchen from the outside.

“Where is it!”  He shouted, slamming one hand on the table as a single glance from too-bright green eyes warned him away from finishing his charge and wrapping his hands around that pampered asshole’s neck.

“Jonathon!”  Martha shouted in turn, her hand reaching up and snagging his shirt-sleeve, tugging him unrelentingly down into the empty chair at her side.  She may have been in a daze, but that _hadn’t_ stopped her from watching and filing away the actions of the other men, including her father.  She didn’t know _what_ they had planned but she didn’t think it was intended to be _hostile_ …baiting of her husband aside.  “Sit down!  And explain.”  She shoved the glass of iced tea and a plate of cookies under his nose, a wordless demand that he get himself together and quit the hysterics.

Which was why Harry sat across from _her_ and not _him_.

He was well-aware from Jor-El’s memories prior to his journey into the past just _who_ wore the pants in this particular family, though even Martha’s sternly-pragmatic nature was often stymied by Jonathon’s sheer bloody-bull-headedness.

“It’s safe.”  Harry told him, both parties making sure to keep certain information away from the lawyer in their midst – relation or not.  “Which is better than I can say it _was_.  A simple padlocked storm-cellar?”  He snorted, giving a roll of his eyes.  “Yes, the absolute _best_ of security that.”

“You…”  Jonathon found himself cut off again, this time by the almost-diffident – at first appearance – man with the distracting facial scarring.

“Perhaps.”  Remus broke in.  “It would be best for Mr. Clark to explain his portion of our business here before we get into the… _particulars_ of the situation?”

“Yes.”  Martha breathed out a sigh of relief.  “Yes, please.”

“Very well.”  William held back his disappointment.  He was rather at sea over what secret Potter knew about regarding something of value – apparently – that his daughter’s husband had kept locked away.  He’d been hoping that they would let something slip to help clue him into the undertones of the situation that he was hearing but was unable to explain.  Regardless, he _did_ have a job to do here, and that was his prompt to do it…that it was going to piss his son-in-law off was merely a bonus.  “Now, Martha, Jonathon, we are all aware that in 1989 you adopted a young boy, a John Doe of approximately three years of age who was believed to be orphaned during the meteor strike, correct?”

Martha and Jonathon shared a dread-filled look, linking hands out of sight beneath the table, each of them starting to get an even _better_ idea of what this all was about…and never feeling more helpless than ever before in their lives.

Somehow, not only did this… _Potter_ know about Clark, but he’d put in motion something that would likely end with their losing custody of him.

And given Potter’s business being in advanced technology, it was a mere one-step below their worst-case scenario of the government discovering their special boy and taking him away.

Still, all they could do at this point was play along with his… _game_ and hope that it wasn’t as horrible as they feared, such as if someone like _Luthor_ had discovered Clark instead.

“Yes, that’s right.”  Martha blew out an unsteady breath.  “The adoption was done through Metropolis United Charities.”

“Yes.”  William nodded his head, wincing a bit inside since he knew that while he was enjoying getting one over on Jonathon, he was hurting his Martha at the same time.  “It was.  Nine years ago, one Joel Ellingson and his wife Lara were traveling to Chicago to celebrate their anniversary, their twin children Kal and Kara accompanying them.  Two weeks into their stay, the Ellingsons went missing, and after a lengthy search of the Chicago area were presumed dead.”  William folded his hands before him, resting on the paperwork that he’d brought along, forwarded by the English firm, that he’d spend the last week authenticating.  “Recently, with records being uploaded more and more to the internet or electronic files, a claim filed by an out-of-business car rental agency was found, stating that the Ellingsons had rented a car and failed to return it.  It wasn’t until recently that a wrecked vehicle in Smallville was matched to the missing car’s VIN, which caused the cold-case of the Ellingsons being reopened…and several months ago their remains were matched to a couple of unclaimed bodies who died in the meteor strike.”

The Kents listened to all of this with growing dread, disbelief in every inch of their bodies as Martha’s father laid out a case so neat and tidy that it had to have taken _years_ of groundwork to put into place.

One thing rolling through their minds as they tried to place Potter’s involvement: how did a man as young as Hazard Potter, who wouldn’t even be eighteen until the end of the month according to common popular knowledge, have a case against their guardianship of Clark _this_ tight?

Moreover, what was his involvement and who had put it together?

“Kal Ellingson was described as being three-years-old.”  William continued delicately, “having black hair and blue eyes.  This is a picture of him with his parents.”

William handed over the photo Jor-El had generated for Harry, showing Jor-El, Lara, a de-aged Kara and a young Kal-El at about a year old, all wearing clothes circa the late eighties and showing the distinct resemblance between Jor-El and Kal-El.  The lawyer then handed over a computer print-out of various composites that had been put together that estimated what twelve-year-old Kal and Kara would look like, many of the boys sharing similarities with Clark, with one being a dead-ringer for the absent pre-teen while the girls all had a striking resemblance to Clark despite many having blonde hair.

The Kents took both stoically, already waiting for something along those lines, and waited for William to continue telling the what-they-knew-as-fabricated tale.

“Of all the adoptions done of boys matching Kal’s age and appearance, none are even close to that of Clark.  I’m sorry, Martha.”  And he actually was, knowing for himself what it was like to be faced with losing a child, though Clark was much younger than Martha had been when Kent stole her away.  “But while a DNA test will be needed to confirm it, all the dots connect: Clark Kent is Kal Ellingson.”

“What does that mean?”  Jonathon asked after clearing his throat, time to cool-down having given him the clarity of mind to start dealing with the situation.  “DNA match, is there a living relative, or…?”

“Not exactly.”  Harry answered after a glance at the lawyer.  “Joel Ellingson was best-friends with my _birth father_.”  Harry emphasized, quirking a half-smile as the Kents realized that with him it was more a case of _what_ they were dealing with than _who_.  “And was a brilliant man, a scientist and doctor.  He was experimenting with cryogenics when he disappeared with his wife and children, KGI acquired all rights to his research which included his frozen DNA samples from his work.  With Kal being male, we can make a paternal DNA match from that sample.”

Eyebrows rising, Jonathon had to admit – to himself at least – at being impressed with the depths of preparations that had been taken before confronting them…and that bit about Potter’s own _birth father_ cleared up quite a bit of the confusion he – and he knew Martha – had been feeling, especially with Clark’s missing ship.

Potter didn’t just _know_ about Clark he was _like_ Clark.

Which ushered in a whole new realm of nightmares and worst-case-scenarios for the Kents.

William took the situation back in hand, continuing with a firm-but-gentle approach as he was all-too-cognizant of the pain losing a child can cause, though his Martha had been a young woman when Kent stole her away and not a vulnerable pre-teen such as Clark.

“The Ellingsons both left wills behind, with detailed instructions regarding the guardianship of their children, including a trust that was established from their estates once their deaths were confirmed.”  William rose, leaving the documents next to Harry.  “It includes a generous financial amount, as well as a large stretch of pristine Arctic landscape that comprises the majority of a protected wildlife refuge that Lara Ellingson established before her death that will belong solely to Kal upon his eighteenth birthday.”

“Thank you, Mr. Clark.”  Harry nodded to the lawyer who as planned was adjourning to the Bentley to allow Harry and Remus to discuss the situation more fully with the Kents.  He would be invited back when it came time to handle the rest of the legalities.  “Your help has been much appreciated.”

“Jonathon.”  William gave the younger man a frosty handshake, warming considerably when faced with a cheek-kiss from his daughter.  “Martha.  I’m here to help this…situation go as smoothly as possible…for _everyone_ involved.  Please, just listen to what Mr.’s Potter and Lupin have to say…with as _open_ a mind as you can manage.”  With that last pot-shot at his son-in-law, William took his leave, Harry holding up his hand and watching Remus who had his head cocked to the side in a listening posture.  Once the amber-eyed man nodded, Harry lowered his hand in a gesture that signaled the real beginning of their confrontation.

“You’re like him, aren’t you?”  Martha broke the ice, staring with a mix of shock and fascination at the ebony-haired man with his too-green eyes.  Eyes as green as her Clark’s were blue.  An _inhuman_ shade for most to bear.  “Like Clark?”

Harry held out his hand in a see-saw motion, explaining: “Yes and no.  That bit about our fathers was true.  Jor-El, father of Kal-El, _was_ best-friends with Dru-Zod, father of Har-Zod.  But my mother was of a different species where Lara Zor-Van was also Kryptonian, as were Kara’s parents Jor-El’s brother Zor-El and his wife.”

“Har-Zod?”  Jonathon arched a brow with a smirk.  “As in Harry _Hazard_ Potter?”

“My mate’s fault.”  Remus owned up to the nickname with a soft smile, his eyes sharp on the Kents despite his genial expression.  “He gave Harry that name when he was eleven and we learned just how _different_ our best-friends’ adopted son was.”

“Adopted?”  Martha sucked in a breath, eyes wide, her hand coming up to cover her mouth.  “Like…?”  She couldn’t bear to bring herself to ask.

“I didn’t come down in a spaceship and a hail of meteorites like the cousins, if that’s what you’re avoiding asking.”  Harry chuckled with a roll of his eyes.  “When I said my mother was different – I meant it.  She had other ways of sending me to safety.”

Martha leaned back in her chair, reaching out – this time in plain view – and taking hold of her Jonathon’s hand.

“Then I was right.”  She murmured.  “I’ve always thought…I mean, why else would you send a child into _space_ , let alone, alone?  I just _knew_ it was to protect him…”

“Protect him.”  Jonathon questioned, frowning still at the green-eyed _alien_ across from his wife.  It was one thing when the alien in question was a young boy he’d raised from a sprite, but to see a grown-man version of Clark…even a young one was raising all of Jonathon’s red-flags to protect himself and his wife from the invader.  “From what?”

“The end of our world.”  Harry told them with only a hint of grief in his voice.  “The end of Krypton.  There’s only a handful of us left, now.  Three for certain I know of on Earth – and Clark is the youngest of us, though until I’m able to locate Kara I have no idea what age she’ll be when removed from cryo-stasis.”  He unbent enough to explain.  “Kara is technically between myself and Kal in age, but her ship was lost and has yet to be recovered…though I’m closer all the time.  An extensive backstory is in place, I simply hope we find her before Kal reaches eighteen or it’ll be much harder to explain a twin sister who looks significantly younger than Kal.”

“Why now?”  Jonathon snapped out.  “Why come looking for him now?  Why tell us all this?  We just want to be a normal family and left alone, not caught up in all your.”  He sneered.  “Alien bullshit.”

“Why tell you?”  Harry arched a brow, smirking, knowing all the while that he was re-rousing a formidable temper.  “Because who would you tell, even if you could?”  He waved his hands expansively, saying nothing of the secrecy clause they were already under.

He’d gone into the business of farming loans and grants to farmers transitioning between conventional and organic farming for a reason that had nothing to do with preserving the planet – though that was important as well – and _everything_ to do with getting the Kents to sign a contract with a hidden, magically binding, secrecy clause regarding everything to do with their son, Harry, and Krypton.  All of it.  Every single piece of the puzzle that the Kents knew, bound in a contract that they couldn’t break.

The only reason they _didn’t_ know about it – or that something strange was going on when it came to that information – was because they’d chosen to live such strict lives of secrecy already.

But Harry wasn’t going to count on that when faced with a challenge to their status quo.

He preferred guarantees over goodwill.

“The media, the government.”  Harry scoffed.  “Report on me and you might as well strap Kal to the examination table yourselves.”

“His name is Clark Kent.”  Jonathon bit out, infuriated – mainly because he knew Harry – or Hazard or Har-Zod or whatever he called himself – was one-hundred-percent right.  They _wouldn’t_ try and use the information against him.  They _couldn’t_ , not without risking something they loved.

“His name.”  Harry sighed, rubbing his temples.  “Is Kal-El, son of Jor-El, and the last son of Krypton.  Fight the truth all you want – but you’ll never change it.  You’ve let him believe himself some sort of freak of nature – but a _human_ freak of nature.  And now he’s twelve years old, is on the verge of growing up, and doesn’t know a _damned thing_ except that he isn’t safe to be around.”

“You say we let him believe he’s human like it’s a crime…”  Jonathon argued, Martha sitting back and watching gathering information much like Potter’s companion.

“It might as well be.”  Harry hissed, eyes narrowed.  “You’ve given him a shaky foundation, Kent.  On one hand, you’ve loved him and taught him love, and helping others, and given him a moral compass to follow.  But on the other, you’ve taught him to hate and _fear_ himself, to always be in control, to never slip up, that his own judgement can’t be trusted,” he rolled his eyes.  “And on and on and on.  I could do this all day.  Your prejudice against anything outside your narrow, small-town-farm-boy worldview is showing, Mr. Kent.”

Hands clenched, Jonathon made a movement to stand that was aborted by his wife laying on hand on his tense arm and a murmured “Jonathon.”

“If I understand the situation correctly.”  Martha shoved down her emotions over what was happening and carried on with the business of the day before her husband started a fight with a… _person_ she was certain had abilities at least equal to her son’s…and likely more dangerous.  She didn’t want to end up married to a smear on the floor, after all.  “From what my father said, you’ve set it up so someone else has a right to custody over my Clark.  May I ask who?”

“That would be me, Mrs. Kent.”  Remus spoke up in his gentle-but-unyielding way.  “I’m Harry’s godfather, Remus Lupin.  My mate and I raised him – or he raised us, it’s hard to say sometimes – from when he was eleven years old.”  He beamed a bit over at the youngest-CEO-in-history.  “I like to think, temper aside, that we’ve done a good job with him.”

“I see.”  Martha tapped one finger on the wooden table top.  “What _exactly_ , did you have in mind Mr. Potter?”

“Kal’s abilities are about to start increasing.”  Harry let that sink in, enjoying the startled and worried glance that the Kents exchanged.  “More than that, for all that we _look_ human…we really aren’t.”

“I don’t know if you’re aware, Mr. and Mrs. Kent.”  Remus chipped in.  “But Harry attends the foremost technology university in the world, and he’s due to graduate soon – which is early – with two Masters degrees.”  Remus shrugged sipping at his iced tea when he got a _look_ from Hazard.  He was proud of his cub, so sue him.  “And he’s been like that – able to do advanced math equations like I tally basic addition – since he was a child.  The normal public school experience would have been a disaster – and it was for the time that his adoptive-aunt and her husband had custody of him.”

“What do you mean?”  Martha asked, eyebrows furrowing a bit.  “I thought…”

“My adoptive parents.”  Harry explained patiently.  “The Potters, died when I was fifteen months old.  I was sent to live with my mother’s sister and her family from there.”  He grimaced.  “And as I’m sure you’re aware, being _different_ , being a _freak_ isn’t always dealt with as _lovingly_ as you have dealt with Kal’s abilities.  He needs training on his abilities and an education to train his mind.  Neither of which can be provided in Smallville, Kansas.”

Jonathon merely grunted at the implied slur to his home.

“What’s been put in place.”  Harry continued, ignoring the man and focusing on the mother.  “Is a sort of shared-custody agreement.  During the school year, Kal will live with Remus and receive the training he needs as a Kryptonian living on Terra Sol.  During breaks, he’ll be free to return to your home, with supervision from Remus or someone else who can be trusted to make sure there aren’t any information leaks or issues.  We already have an agreement in place for him to take correspondence classes with Magnus Academy in London…”  He trailed off thoughtfully.  “I’m not sure if you’ve heard of it?”

“I have.”  Martha sighed, chewing a bit on her lip.  “It’s one of the best boarding schools in the world.  How will be explain all of this?”

“Martha!”  Jonathon whirled on his wife in outrage.  “You can’t _seriously_ be considering…”

“What, Jonathon, what?”  Martha snapped back.  “You realize that they have us over a barrel, don’t you?  They don’t _have_ to play ball with us, they could have just presented their documentation – which with my father involved I _know_ is air-tight and above-board – to the courts and taken him away.  At least this way we get to still have time with our son, instead of having to wait _six years_ for him to seek us out – if he even _wants_ to at that point since soon enough he’ll realize that we’ve _lied_ to him his entire life.  He’ll get an education – one of the best – and training on how to be a…”  She checked with Harry.  “A Kryptonian?”

“Kryptonian, yeah.”  Harry arched a brow.  “Plus the inheritance.  That’s not just for show – there’s an actual account, which includes a stipend for his guardians, nine years of which will be forwarded to you since you took him in and have cared well for him all these years.”

“We don’t _want_ your damned money for our son.”  Jonathon seethed.  “He’s not for sale!”

“And I never said he was.”  Harry countered, hanging onto his cool by the barest of threads.  “Nevertheless, with a young Kryptonian who hadn’t learned control, I’m _certain_ you had plenty of extra expenses over the years.  That’s all the money is for.”  He quirked his mouth.  “Besides, which…you never had any problem taking my money before.”

“What do you…”  Martha trailed off, eyes wide as the memory of the grant they’d been given came fresh to her mind.  “Organic Solutions International.”  She closed her eyes, shaking her head.  They’d given the Kent Farm a substantial grant five years before to begin transitioning to an organic operation.  “You own it.”

“Mhmm.”  Harry nodded his head.  “That’s the problem with showmanship I suppose.  People never stop to look at what’s underneath: in this case that KGI is involved with a lot more than just technology advancements.  The stipend was set up to be approximately twenty-thousand American per year, not enough to live on but enough to alleviate the expense of a child.  The full inheritance he’ll come into is several million dollars.”

“That’s one hundred and eighty thousand dollars.”  Martha did the math in a blink.  “Where is it all coming from?  I doubt space-faring aliens have accounts at the savings and loan.”

Harry chuckled at that.  “Not exactly.  But my adoptive parents were wealthy, old money as the saying goes.  When I started setting up Kal’s background and filling in the holes one Lionel Luthor left behind I transferred a small amount into a fund for Kal to pump up the story.”

“I don’t know that I want you anywhere _near_ my son.”  Jonathon eyed him.  Old money just added to the image of Harry being the embodiment on everything he hates.

“I won’t be.”  Harry told them to their surprise.  “That’s why Remus is to be his guardian and not me.  Legally I’ll hold the guardianship but in reality it’ll be him.  I can’t be too involved in Kal’s life for other reasons.”

“College, company.”  Martha smirked a little.  “All work and not play?”

“Something like that.”  Harry told her, not even about to get into the trine issue.  Having too big a part in Kal’s training was _way_ too close to grooming for him to be comfortable with.  “And Mr. Kent…”  He added silkily, easily reading the intentions forming behind blue eyes.  “Before you get any ideas of running off – there’s nowhere on _earth_ I couldn’t find you.  And trust me – you wouldn’t like my reaction to such an event.”

Without further discussion, William was called back in and the custody agreements and all the paperwork having to do with Kal – including an official change-of-name to Kal Clark Ellingson-Kent, which _really_ got Jonathon’s goat – were signed and notarized, making everything clean, tidy, and legal, including the wire transfer of the “maintenance stipend” that the Kents were to receive backdated to 1989.

“Excellent.”  Harry said, hanging back to speak with Martha after Jonathon had gone off to sulk in the barn and the rest of his party were waiting patiently in the car.  “Remus will be back to meet Kal tomorrow, and will visit weekly during this summer to let them get used to each other.  Kal will also have to take a series of placement tests that he’ll proctor towards the beginning of the school year.”

“How long will this last?”  She asked, looking up at those inhuman eyes.  “Him having to go away for nine months of the year?”

“I don’t know.”  Harry told her honestly.  “It depends on how well he copes with the influx of information.  It could be just this year, it could take all the way through high school or beyond.  I don’t know.”  He repeated, then bid her goodbye.

And he really didn’t.

The last time, Kal fought with Jor-El, resisted any but the most basic of training, which took a year-and-a-half with his eighteen-year-old brain.

As a younger, more flexible, but also less mature Kal?

It was impossible to determine.

Though for Harry’s part, he couldn’t _wait_ to find out and properly meet Kal-El in all his glory.

…

That night, after Clark had been tucked into bed none the wiser for the earth-shattering revelations that had gone one earlier that day, Jonathon and Martha discussed things a bit more after giving themselves each the afternoon and evening to turn things over in their own minds.

One or two things stuck out for each of them once they’d thought on it.

“He never said _what_ happened to their home.”  Jonathon said, their conversation pitched low as they sat up in bed, covers around their hips as Martha cuddled into his chest, his arm around her shoulders.  “I wonder if that’s one of the reasons why he’s so insistent on Clark being trained?  That whatever happened might follow them or something?”

“He struck me.”  Martha said slowly.  “As someone who has seen both the best and the worst and is just trying to protect Clark out of a sense of duty and protectiveness.  That their fathers were best-friends sounded sincere, the same with Clark being the youngest of their… _kind_.”  She paused, then decided to go ahead.  “And I think there’s something more to why he doesn’t want to be too directly involved with Clark.  I just can’t put my finger on what.”

“And _I_ think.”  Jonathon countered.  “That he’s had an eye on us for a long time, longer than his age suggests.  He knew too much about how we’ve raised Clark for me to believe otherwise.  And I _really_ don’t like taking his money – now or then, whether I knew it at the time or not.”

“I don’t think we’re going to be able to avoid it, Jonathon.”  Martha told him with a smirk.  “When it comes to hard-heads, I think you might’ve met your match in Hazard Potter.”

Jonathon snorted, pulling his wife over in his arms to sprawl over him fully.

“I already met my match.”  He whispered into her red hair.  “In a sassy socialite from Metropolis who had no problem taking this old farm boy to task – and still does, when I need it.”


	5. Four

**Time and Again**

" _One change always leaves the way prepared for the introduction of another…"_

_Niccoló Machiavelli – "The Prince"_

**Chapter Four: The More Things Change…**

_September 1, 1998; The Kent Farm, Smallville, Kansas_

Clark hadn't been sure what to make of the stranger his parents had introduced as "Mr. Remus Lupin" when the man with the weird-gold eyes and the scars on his face had shown up on the farm out of the blue in early July.

The way his parents had spoken to the man made it clear to Clark that this was someone they were familiar with – even if they didn't necessarily like him.

A feeling that he'd gotten from his father's frown and the little pinch to his mother's lips.

Clark had known two things just about as long as he could remember: that he was  _different_  and the he was adopted, revelations that had struck him one after the other when he was about six years old.

…

He'd always known that he was stronger than his parents – in that way all children know when they're different from adults. But  _how_  different wasn't made clear to him until one of his very first trips into town. Before that day, he'd always stay home with one of his parents while the other went into Smallville or Metropolis for errands.

But after being careful and training with rubber balls on how to control his strength – and warning after warning about not running around – he'd been deemed old and smart enough to go with his dad to pick up some antibiotics for one of the sick calves.

He'd seen another little boy running after his ball and asked his dad why the boy couldn't catch it – it wasn't rolling that fast – only for his dad to answer "he isn't fast enough, Clark." Then when the ball had rolled under a planter trough out of the boy's reach, he'd asked why he didn't pick up the trough and get it that way. His dad answered: "He isn't strong enough, Clark."

But Clark  _was_.

He was fast enough to have caught the ball, and strong enough to lift the trough, and for the first time he really understood just how  _different_  that made him.

After all, it wasn't an adult thing.

That little boy wasn't much younger than he was, and he couldn't do what Clark could.

Later that same day, while his dad was treating him to a sundae at the Fordman's store, he'd overheard something and been puzzled by it, tucking it away to ask about later, which he had during bedtime stories.

"Mama?" He'd asked, bright blue eyes blinking up at his parents guilelessly. "What does it mean that you and Daddy  _took me in_? Were you supposed to leave me somewhere…is it…because I'm different?"

"Oh honey, now." Martha had rushed to soothe her worried baby boy. "Not at all. It's just…"

"Clark." His dad jumped in, sitting down on the edge of Clark's bed. "Do you remember when we found those orphaned kittens, and took them to Boots and she kept them, made them  _her_  kittens, feeding them and all?"

"Yes." Clark beamed up at his daddy. "Cause Boots is the best mama-kitty ever!"

"Right." Jonathon chuckled. "Well, like those kittens weren't Boots', erm,  _belly_  kittens," he explained, Clark being old enough – and curious enough – to have that much of an idea where babies and kittens and calves all came from. At least "the baby grows in the mama's belly" version of events anyway. "But she made them her kittens anyway, you weren't our belly-baby but we adopted you and now you're our son, okay? That's what that meant when Mrs. Fordman said that."

"Then." Clark frowned, looking up at his parents. "What happened to my belly parents?"

"We don't know sweetheart." Martha leaned down, giving him a kiss. "But we know that they loved you, whatever happened…"

…

So, when Mr. Lupin had arrived, and told him a story about his parents being  _different_  too, and dying, that had been easy enough to believe.

It was everything else that came along with it that was harder to swallow.

Like being an honest-to-goodness  _alien_ , and having another secret to keep from Pete and his other friends like Greg and Abigail.

Like having to  _go-away_  to learn how to be an alien instead of a farmer's son, having to  _not_  go to public school like had been promised, and a whole lot of  _other things_  that he'd been told…and had a hard time believing.

But Mr. Lupin had come once a week like clockwork, starting him on some studies for the placement tests he'd taken last week, and telling him stories about raising another boy…a boy who was supposed to be like Clark.

Who was  _different_  and  _adopted_  and  _alien_  too.

A boy who he wasn't going to meet, probably for a long time, because he was  _also_  eighteen, and going to college, and running one of the biggest companies in the world that made the  _coolest_ stuff.

Little did Clark know, that being an  _alien_  was one of the least exciting things he was going to learn about…

"Ready, Clark?" Mr. Lupin asked, once he'd said his goodbye-for-nows to his parents, his mother looking teary-eyed as she clutched onto his father.

"Yes, sir." Clark answered, taking hold of the shiny piece of metal that Mr. Lupin told him – and his parents – was a device that let him come-and-go between London and their farmhouse as needed.

"Alright, then hold tight, and  _don't let go_." Remus gave the brave young man a comforting smile, nodded to the Kents, then engaged the Portkey with a soft _: "Portus."_

…

"What in the world…?" Martha wondered, as the day after Clark went away for the Fall school term – though she was still a bit foggy on the exact  _nature_  of his education – she heard what sounded like a car back-firing in the yard.

Jonathon had heard the noise as well, leaving the barn where he'd been working his frustrations out by restacking the straw bales, only to find his wife speaking with none other than the cause of his grief: one Hazard Potter.

"Clark's left already, Mr. Potter." Martha greeted him politely even though a large part of her wished to consign him to the devil…or call him the devil himself. Logically, she understood  _why_  she'd agreed and pushed Jonathon to agree to his  _proposal_  as far as Clark's education.

That didn't mean she liked it, or wanted the… _creature_  around anymore than necessary.

She frowned looking around. "And I don't see your car…"

"As I'm sure you're aware, Mrs. Kent." Harry smiled at her genially. "I don't really need one to get from place to place. I actually left my car and driver in town before  _popping_ over for a talk."

"Potter?" Jonathon asked with a scowl, stomping over. "What are you doing here? I thought with Clark gone away to your  _training_  you wouldn't be darkening our doorstep."

Harry gave a half-grin and shook his head bemusedly.

At least the Kents were consistent.

"As I've said before, there's reasons why I can't be around Kal-El until he's finished his training." Harry reiterated their discussion in July. "But he actually doesn't have anything to do with why I'm here – well." He corrected himself. "Not  _much_  reason anyway." Harry shrugged, sliding his hands into the pockets of his expertly-tailored designer suit. It was sleek black, with the only color coming from the pale green shirt and pocket square that brought out his eyes and the flash of platinum and emerald from his cuffs and wrist-watch. "You see, the AI who is in charge of his training, has determined that he'll finish his training – accounting for any extra tangents he might decide to study – in about five years, minus the breaks for winter, spring, and summer, which will put him somewhere around sixteen."

"And he'll be able to come home to stay." Martha breathed, joy filling her. It was hard sending him away, even knowing that it wasn't forever or that it was in his best interest – Harry had been very clear on that last point. That they'll have  _some_  time with him before he went off as an adult…it meant the world to her.

"Yes." Harry smiled genuinely for the first time in their short acquaintance, the grin brightening his face and lending a softness to him that was usually absent for the serious and driven young…man? Kryptonian? "He will, since in the States he can't be an adult – other than through emancipation – until he's eighteen. Which  _does_  create a bit of a problem. He'll be finished with his schooling by then, he placed well ahead of humans his age in math and sciences, and was ahead though not as far in liberal arts: English, languages, etc." Harry shrugged. "He'll be ready for college before he's ready to come home, and at that point if I just let him stay after taking such an interest in him…"

"There'll be talk." Jonathon folded his arms across his chest, looking down for a moment to study his boots. "What's your plan? I know men like you, you have one already or you wouldn't be talking to us."

"Case in point: I'm Kryptonian there  _are_  no men like me." Harry corrected him drily. Jor-El had gotten his way and Harry had spent a couple of weeks in July undergoing his  _perfecting_ , unlocking his full Kryptonian heritage, as had been done once before. That neither of them commented on his increased size and mass merely spoke to the human ability to ignore uncomfortable truths, even when they were staring them in the face. "But, yes. I've a plan." Tilting his head towards where the fertilizer plant laid he explained. "Back in 1991, a company came through with license from the government to collect all of the meteorites as could be found, including purchasing any land that was found to be severely tainted by exposure."

"Global Conservation Systems." Martha said, nodding as she stepped over into her husband's side. "They gave cash-in-hand for any of the rocks, no matter the size or condition. We probably made a few thousand dollars from the clean-up, most everyone around here did, save for the people who lost their land."

And even they got fair market value for the tainted lands instead of whatever the government deigned to pay.

"Right." Harry nodded. "GCS is a subsidiary of KGI. I'm the one who collected up the rocks – as well as any other evidence that not  _just_  rocks came down that day. As a result, I have quite a bit of land that's been lying fallow for a number of years while it recuperates. And as of the studies done on a few of the fields, some are officially safe for use again."

"What are you planning to use them  _for_?" Jonathon asked the pertinent question.

"One of my newest ventures." Harry smiled. "Thanks to Starbucks, and other chains like it, coffee is big business and getting bigger by the day. You don't have the right climate in the States to grow it, but in recent years I've purchased several coffee plantations and have moved them back to more traditional and conservation-friendly shade-grown production methods. Now that my venture has achieved fair-trade, organic status, it's time to start bringing it into the States and Europe, which means to coffee roasting plants."

"You're putting a plant here in Smallville." Jonathon caught on quickly, easily following the chain as a farmer himself. "Roasting and distribution, right? Give you an excuse to hang around when Clark has to come back, outside of my son himself."

"Basically: yes." Harry agreed. "In the next year or two I'm also going to be putting in a satellite office space here, probably an apartment in the same building. It won't be the labs at KGI or Lausanne, but it'll suffice for a couple of years."

"Okay…" Jonathon drawled, arching a brow. "What do you need from us?"

"Not a thing." Harry said cheerily. "Just didn't want you to be caught flat-footed by your neighbors when they start talking about the KGI plant going in practically on your doorstep, and by Kal's new shared-custody guardian no less. Besides which…" He smirked. "I thought you'd enjoy knowing that it'll take away at least  _some_  of the economic chokehold Lionel Luther enjoys over Smallville…in fact." He chuckled darkly. "I'm willing to bet it'll put the grizzly old bastard's nose right out of joint…"

…

_November 30, 1998; The Fortress of Solitude, Arctic Circle_

"How are they doing?" Remus asked as he came to stand beside his cub who was watching over the pod-type enclosure that held the still form of Clark Kent/Kal-El.

The werewolf was the only being in existence other than Harry and the cousins who had access to the Fortress, able to come and go at will to check in on the young pre-teen who was being "trained" through the Kryptonian technology Jor-El had sent with his son. What had once been a back-up repository of knowledge had become a true Fortress of Krypton, with all the bells and whistles that went with it. Including a version of immersive training that Harry had already spent years trying to adapt to human tech and physiology, a project that would likely take a lifetime or more to complete.

That was fine, as long as the sun burned yellow, Harry had more than enough  _time_  on his hands to complete any project under its rays that he pleased.

People might look at his shiny toys and roll their eyes, but the truth of the matter was, his flash and dazzle did more to draw attention  _away_  from the more…subversive actions he was taking to protect his world.

His mother had been of Terra Sol, his adoptive parents who'd died for him, his godfathers, even one of his trine-mates.

Terra Sol was the only home he had left, and Harry would defend and protect it with all the ferocity he'd once used to destroy Dark Lord after Dark Lord.

Kal, he knew from Jor-El, had felt the same since of home and protection for Terra Sol that Harry himself did, as did their Lex from all accounts.

The differences – or perhaps the devil – was in the details, how they all  _chose_  to act on those protective instincts.

Lex was a conqueror, a man very much kin to the one he'd been named after, leading from the front and never wavering in his resolve.

Kal was a hero, a true champion of the people, with a sheer  _goodness_  that drew people to him for the protection from the evils of life that he offered.

And Harry?

Harry was a general, like all the Kryptonians of his House before him, fierce, determined, and above all  _dangerous_  in ways the others couldn't match for sheer power.

Together they would have – and hopefully this time  _will_  – become the greatest force for defense and protection against what is often a predatory galactic community…to say nothing of the predators at home.

If, Harry laughed a bit to himself at the irony of just  _what_  their future hinged on, they can survive Kal's teenage years intact.

Harry shot Remus a glance from the corner of his eye, never fully turning his attention from the young form in the pod. The werewolf was bundled up from head-to-toe, knowing from experience it could take the Fortress up to an hour or more to come up to human-friendly temperatures…especially now that winter was knocking in the Arctic. As a werewolf, he was a little more resistant to the extreme temperatures, but even he was susceptible to the extreme cold of the Arctic Winter months of November through February which at the moment was a rather balmy negative thirty degrees Celsius, as in the coldest parts of winter it gets down to the negative fifty degrees range.

Much to Remus's chagrin, neither Harry nor Kal or Kara in their pods gave any sign of reacting to the cold, though Kal was merely wearing an oversized white sleep shirt and loose pants to account for growth spurts during the "training", while Kara was wearing the same skin-tight leotard-type clothing she was found in and Harry was obnoxiously attired – to Remus's mind at least – in a plain tissue-thin silk t-shirt in emerald green and some expensive designer jeans.

Sirius had most certainly enjoyed teaching their cub the finer points of haute couture and spending ridiculous amounts of money on everything from their wardrobes to their cars to their homes.

His love had many fine points but a  _frugal_  wizard, he was not.

And as Sirius – and then Harry – had enjoyed pointing out more than once to the thrifty-minded Remus, they had more money than even they could spend in a hundred lifetimes…so why not enjoy it?

Though Remus imagined, given the way young Kal was raised, Harry and Sirius were going to have a much harder target on their hands when the time came to outfit the young son of Krypton than they'd ever had with Remus…and serves them right, the clothes-horses.

Positively  _no one_  did penny-pinching frugality better than a farmer and a farmer's wife, getting the Kents to agree to taking more than they'd already been strong-armed into by Harry's machinations was going to be a chore and a half, even for his cunning cub, despite his being ostensibly Kal's co-guardian at this point.

"He's doing well." Harry told him, sharp green eyes darting with inhuman quickness over the center console's read-outs, simultaneously keeping an eye on Jor-El's teaching of Kal as well as staying up to date on a dozen other areas of interest that the AI was tracking for him. "Jor-El, this time at least, is doing a better job with him, using a combination of immersion study to really let him get a  _feel_  for what it is to be all at once a son of Krypton and a refugee – basically – on Terra Sol. Jor-El is teaching both equally, which is huge." He conceded, knowing that the AI was monitoring them as well as all the other tasks it was performing. "Last time he focused solely on Krypton and Kal refused anything other than basic training."

"It was high-handed, stern, from what you told me." Remus noted, words only muffled a little by his scarf-wrapped face. "This time it chose a more fatherly-mentor route instead of a taskmaster. Your doing?"

"Mhmm." Harry nodded in agreement. "One of the abilities of the Fortress is to take copies of a mind. Living histories if you will. Before I let Jor-El within a hundred miles of Kal I made sure it had one of mine."

"What, all of it?" Remus's head snapped around to stare at the too-perfect profile of his cub. "From…the first time…everything?"

Harry gave him a grim smile and nod. "Over a hundred years of memories, including seeing for himself just  _how bad_  his fuck-ups with Kal were the first time around. Given enough of an incentive, even an AI with a superiority complex the size of the 28 known galaxies can change." Harry lifted his head an smirked over at the scowling version of Jor-El's face that had popped up when Harry said "even an AI." After all, it wasn't like the AI could  _deny_  the charge. "It just doesn't  _like_  to."

"As you have said before Har-Zod." Jor-El commented stiffly. "Kal-El is a son of Krypton but with the heart of a Terran. Methods that work with a Kryptonian child would be… _ill-advised_  with one such as my son."

"What is so different?" Remus had to ask, having seen for himself that despite his  _obvious_  differences in terms of physical abilities and intelligence, Kal was very much a normal twelve-year-old boy. "Between a son of Krypton and of Earth?"

"Culture, mostly, which is something we're working on with Kara as well as searching for all the hidden commands from her father." Harry answered after exchanging a glance with Jor-El. It was another of those subjects where the two had agreed to disagree. What Harry saw as indoctrination and grooming, Jor-El saw as proper discipline and training. And what Harry thought the right way to raise children, the AI viewed as a deplorable lack of structure and, well, a breeding ground for overly emotional, lazy people. In the end, they'd shelved the argument, knowing it was mostly a moot point as Krypton was dead and gone. However,  _both_  of them found what Zor-El had done to Kara, turning her into a sleeper-agent was foul in the extreme. "Kryptonians were raised to obey: their parents, the council, their teachers, etc." Harry waved a hand in an arcing gesture. "And to keep their word above all else, having a rigid moral code and sense of honor. Whereas…"

"We value free-will." Remus nodded, seeing at once how the two culture could easily come to loggerheads. "Creativity, innovation, especially in the western culture Kal was raised in. All things that tend to buck against ideals like obedience and xenophobia."

"It  _was_ ," Jor-El conceded on this point. "The downfall of us, along with our hubris. My counterpart tried to warn the Council but they could not,  _would_ not conceive of such a danger to our way of life. And they forbid him to speak of it again, or to try and leave with Lara. He did all he could do to circumvent his vow: sending Kal to Terra Sol with the rest of our knowledge and myself to transition the repository from a storage cache into a true Fortress."

"Sounds like someone else I know who moved heaven and earth to save his people." Remus murmured, staring pointedly at his cub who ignored him save for a slight blush on his cheekbones.

"Indeed, Mr. Lupin." Jor-El agreed, much to Harry's shock. "The two of them, at their cores, were not so different in the end."

"That's the problem." Harry said with a bitter laugh. "They both ended: Krypton and Terra Sol. Jor-El couldn't save Krypton. But I'll be damned if  _this time_  I can't save Earth. Start easing Kal-El out of the program, Jor-El." Harry commanded, turning away from the console. He had a pair of theses to work on before the end of his school year in May. "He needs to be ready to return to Black Manor tomorrow for studies before his term exams at Magnus."

"And Kara, cub?"

Harry shook his head. "That's a trickier issue. Rooting out programming like she was subjected to requires examining every single memory. Even with Jor-El's capabilities it'll take time."

Which was fine with Harry.

He had no intention of waking her before the "linchpin" moment of Lex and Kal's meeting.

That he had a legitimate reason to delay her waking up once Jor-El was able to link to her ship and remotely pilot it to the Arctic was merely all to the better as it saved him a fight with both the AI and with Remus.

She would still be on-ice less time than in the original timeline so Harry had zero qualms over keeping her in suspended animation.

If there was one thing he would protect even over and above his home, it was the lives of his trine.

Even if it meant keeping an innocent girl prisoner while an AI sorts through her every last neuron to make  _certain_  that this time she wasn't a threat.

…

_January 3, 1999; The Kent Farm, Smallville_

"What's that, Mom?" Clark asked as his mother stared out a heavy envelope that had come in the day's mail. Even from across the room he could see that it was heavier paper, more expensive than most of the stuff they got. Like the thick paper that made up the farm truck's registration or his parent's wedding certificate.

Being back on the farm, even for just three weeks, was… _weird._

He had all this new  _stuff_  in his head, things about the seeding of planets all across the twenty-eight galaxies during the original  _Big Bang_  event that scientists had pin-pointed throughout the known universe, which flew in the face of what he'd been taught about creation in his homeschool science classes. How life had taken root on some planets and died out early on others. Learning that humans were only considered to be in their infancy compared to other races had been a head trip and a half.

But there were other things he'd learned as well, things that made sense of all the  _strangeness,_ the  _freakiness_  that he'd grown up with.

Clark had been confused, afraid, and down-right skeptical at first when his,  _origins_ he supposed, had been explained to him.

His parents had always poo-pooed his differences, but Clark had known  _something_  was indelibly  _wrong_  with him when compared to other children. He was a kid – a pre-teen now – that didn't make him stupid. In fact, how  _not stupid_  he was when compared to other kids or even his parents was one of the things that made him strange in the first place.

It had never been enough of an explanation to sate him, especially with the ground-in life of secrecy surrounding him they'd maintained throughout his conscious memory.

The secret – kept even from him, and believe him they'd had more than one fight about  _that_  doozy of a truth – had been even bigger and more dangerous than he'd thought.

He wasn't human.

He wasn't human…but he wasn't as alone as he'd feared  _either._

That was why he could do the things he could, why he was stronger and smarter and faster, why he healed so quick – when he used to need to heal – and why now he couldn't be hurt or become ill at all.

Clark had a hard time bridging the mental gap between being Kal-El of Krypton and Clark Kent from Smallville…but he had a feeling that the more he learned, the longer he trained, and the older he got, it would become easier to accept.

After all, in three months Jor-El – and that had been a whole 'nother level of weird – the AI version of his birth dad, had barely scratched the surface of history and culture and development from the different galaxies. He'd gotten a broad overview of what it meant to be Kryptonian, and then a Kryptonian on Earth, and a concrete explanation of  _why_  he was on earth and what had happened to his family. Other than that, it'd been all immersion into different planetary cultures, living – after a fashion – through diverse histories. It was fascinating…and mind-blowing, and a massive headache to sort through.

Jor-El and Remus both said it would get easier in time, the more he learned the more things would click into place.

They hadn't been wrong yet, so he was willing to trust them…to a point. Clark was willing to admit – if anyone had thought to ask – that his ability to trust had been damaged, but not broken entirely, by finding out that his parents hadn't just been lying to everyone about him. They'd lied to him as well, consistently and to his face.

Neither of his teachers had as yet done the same that he could tell, but that didn't mean that they wouldn't tell them that a subject was one they couldn't discuss with him – at the moment anyway.

Clark's official "guardian" had been one of those subjects.

For someone who from what he understood of the situation had done a whole lot of wrangling and maneuvering to get him to Jor-El for training, Hazard Potter had been nowhere to be found when it came to actual interaction with Clark, though both Remus and Jor-El had told him he'd been around to check on him while he was in his pod and training.

It had been passed off as him having his reasons – that Remus admitted he didn't know and Jor-El told him point-blank he wasn't allowed to discuss with Clark – and that had been that as far as his trainers were concerned.

Still, it wasn't a bad way to learn, and he was learning a whole lot more and a whole lot faster than he'd ever thought possible.

"It's your results from your term exams, dear." Martha commented, drawing Clark's attention back to the letter in her hand. She slit open the heavy, expensive paper with one of her kitchen knives, then quickly scanned through the introductory letter before setting it aside to review his grades.

Clark knew he'd done well, Remus had seemed pleased with his ability to quickly learn human subjects, a knowledge that was buffered as his mother beamed over at him before rushing over to him and throwing her arms around him in a loving and proud hug.

"Oh Clark." Martha breathed, squeezing the stuffing out of her boy. "I'm so proud of you! Top marks across the board!" She leaned back, then pressed a smacking kiss to his cheek. "You're number three in your class, the only subject you didn't take top-grade on was your literature class, I'll make sure to mention it to Mr. Lupin." Letting go of him she bustled back over to the fridge and smoothed the report card out, hanging it up with a couple of magnets for Jonathon to see when he came back from running out to the store. "We'll celebrate tonight, since you leave again for England tomorrow evening." She decided with a brisk nod. Honestly, seeing his marks – and with only a few weeks' study from what she understood – Martha felt much better about Clark going away for his training, combined with her son's excited descriptions of what he'd been taught by the Kryptonian AI. "What would you like for dessert, dear, your choice."

"Apple pie?" Clark perked up, looking over his shoulder at his mother instead of down at the book Mr. Lupin had given him to read, the other man agreeing with Martha about his need to do a bit of extra study on literature, the subject not coming as naturally to him as anything math or science based. "With homemade ice cream?"

"Coming right up." Martha promised, going over to the fridge and pulling out heavy cream and the other things she'd need to get the ice-cream going.

Some days she swore Jonathon had gotten her that attachment for her mixer just for ice cream more often, a plan often buoyed by the endless appetite of a twelve-year-old boy, alien or human alike, it seemed they all had an empty leg or two to fill during their growing years.

"Awesome." Clark gave another one of those bright Clark grins, then tucked back into his spot on the couch near the fire. Homemade ice cream and apple pie, with no chores to do since they'd gotten them all done already with help from the hired hands that they'd been able to hire with the stipend from Clark's "trust."

His dad hadn't been happy about using the money, but even someone as stubborn as Jonathon had to admit there was no way to keep the farm in the black without it, since Clark wasn't around to super-speed through a lot of the consistent chores like feeding and watering and haying.

Clark was just happy that his parents didn't look so tired all the time anymore, or so worried.

Yeah.

Between the money, and knowing that Clark was getting the help he needed not to end up a lab-rat somewhere, a lot of the burden had lifted from his folks.

And for that alone, Clark was more than willing to sit through endless lectures on things like iambic pentameter and the underlying themes of Shakespeare.

…

_August 13, 1999; Luthor Penthouse, Metropolis_

"What in the world do you  _think_  you are doing, Lex?!" Lionel shouted the moment he cleared the elevator. It chafed at him that he'd had to wait to  _deal_  with his currently-rebelling son and heir. Unfortunately, the very  _moment_  Lex turned eighteen and came into the bulk of his inheritance he'd begun to kick at the traces. Lionel had allowed his son his parties, his wild nights that ended up splashed over front pages from New York to Los Angeles, but  _this?_  This was a step too far. "Would you care to explain  _why_  I received a call from the dean of Metropolis University explaining  _refunded tuition_  for the next term, hmm?"

He'd spoken, consistently lowering his voice until he hit the master bedroom that Lex called his own, as Lionel preferred to live in their mansion in the garden district with the other moguls instead of downtown in the business district like his son.

To no surprise from Lionel, but an ever-increasing amount of rage, he saw exactly what he'd expected to find: taped up packing boxes and stuffed suitcases, with his heir, his  _pride_  among the other elite who only had show-ponies for heirs and heiress while he had a thoroughbred, leaning over a small personal case that he was filling with his affects that he refused to entrust to the staff, the wall safe beside the bed open and empty and the watch given to him by his late mother adorning his wrist.

Though, even Lionel had to admit to envying the late James Potter – foolish adventure seeker that he was – his adopted son and heir. What young Harry had done with KGI was nothing short of impressive. And he'd only just this spring finished his education.

Lionel admired the young mogul – as much as he was capable of admiring anyone other than himself – for sheer brilliance. That he'd somehow managed to neutralize every  _single_  mole Lionel had tried to embed in his organization merely trebled that admiration into genuine respect. Any CEO who could manage as such was someone to be wary of, no matter their age. Though a few of Potter's recent steps seemed rather aggressive for the young man…but then, despite his brilliance, he was just that: young.

"I thought it was all rather self-explanatory, father." Lex said with an accompanying Luthor-grin that wouldn't be out of place on a great white scenting blood in the water. "You insisted I pursue my MBA and other post-bachelors work at MetU. I did. You wanted me to intern with LuthorCorp. I did."

"And did an excellent job." Lionel threw out a rare compliment, knowing that his leverage over his son was little enough thanks to his late wife's machinations. "Which is why…"

Before Lionel could press his child into taking the position created for him as a Vice President at LuthorCorp, mostly dealing with acquisitions since Lex had proven to excel at negociations, he was cut off by Lex slamming shut the hardcase the was packing and turning to face him with burning blue-grey eyes.

"Which is why." Rather than rise his voice as his father did to express his displeasure, Lex chose to becoming deathly quiet. "Now that I am an  _adult_  and of age to make my own decisions regarding my life, I am returning to Princeton to pursue my doctorate in bio-chemistry. I split my time between Metropolis and Oxford for the last three years, father. If you insist I will continue to do so, including carrying out my duties to LuthorCorp." Turning back he shouldered the hardcase and picked up the laptop bag that had been hidden by its bulk on the bed. "But like it – or not – I  _am_  going back to New Jersey." He closed his eyes and shook his head, repressing a weary sigh as his father's face began to resemble a rather overripe tomato. "It's three years, dad. Maybe less. Then I'll come back to LuthorCorp full-time like a good little heir. Just let me have this."

Lionel sucked in a breath, biting back a scathing reply as he considered the proposition.

At least, if nothing else, Lex would have less opportunities to make front-page scandals if he was buried in his beloved sciences in New Jersey, whereas if Lionel tried to stop him – and succeeded – then bad-for-business behavior was a guarantee.

Besides…the so-very-interesting Kent boy was away most of the year.

Until he returned, there was no point to sending Lex down to Smallville under the façade of "training" his heir.

"You  _will_  fulfill your duties to LuthorCorp and your heritage, Alexander." Lionel's voice matched his son's for silky threat-laden promise. "Otherwise, I will do everything within my power to bring you to heel…understand?"

A short, sharp nod was his answer, as Lex strode briskly from the room and out of the apartment, already making the call to have his things shipped to his apartment in New Jersey that he had arranged, as his old one wasn't quite as suitable for a nineteen-year-old doctoral student as it had been for a fourteen-year-old undergrad.

…

_September 29, 1999; The Talon Theatre, Smallville, Kansas_

Martha and Jonathon Kent left the 60th Anniversary showing at the Talon, laughing and hand-in-hand.

The old theater was a little run-down, but it brought back more memories for most of the Smallivlle population than the megaplex out by the highway ever will.

Meg Talon, who at a sprightly fifty-eight had memories of her own revolving around the family business, even being conceived there if the stories her late parents had shared were true, had come down all the way from her rest-home in Arizona to attend, having selected the  _Wizard of Oz_  herself for the event.

Free sodas and popcorn had abounded, and a grand time had been had by all, if tinged with a bit of sadness as many knew that the Talons, specifically Meg's children who ran the theater in her absence, were giving serious thought to closing it down.

The Kents walked into a lobby that was buzzing, and it only took them both a casual glance over the room to guess  _what_ or rather  _who_  had riled up the busy gossip bees of Smallville.

Harry had been seen around Smallville a time or two during the last year as the construction of his new plant had taken place – as he'd implied, a mere stone's throw from the Kent farm which had Jonathon up in arms for the short period of time it'd taken Martha to calm him down – carried on and then went into production in late spring. To Martha's satisfaction and Jonathon's much-calmer grumbling, Harry's plant had had little effect on the surrounding farms, operating without the massive plumes of smoke that sometimes spewed up from the fertilizer plant and the run-off that many locals blamed for the recent rise in cancer and other toxicity-related health concerns. Still, seeing Harry out-and-about was as yet a rare thing in Smallville, though a few of the couple-hundred souls he employed at his coffee-roasting operation had spoken of him possibly putting in an official office in town…which the Kents both knew to be true, they just weren't aware of  _when_  Potter had planned on doing so.

They'd spent a wonderful summer with their son, who despite their misgivings and all the stories that had poured out of him about Krypton and the twenty-eight galaxies and so on, as well as shooting up some more in height, strength, and speed, they found to still be very much  _their son_.

Clark was still Clark, as sweet sometimes as the day was long in the Kansas summer, and as occasionally moody as any teenager.

But one major difference they'd noted was his, well,  _shine_.

Clark had a confidence in himself that until they'd seen it for themselves upon his return in June, they'd never even realized was lacking.

He didn't slump to hide that he was taller or boarder than his friends Pete or Greg, and he wasn't as timid about joining in their rough-and-tumble children's games, even when little Abigail would come over to join in as well.

To their shame, they'd finally accepted what Harry had been trying to tell them all along: Clark had been afraid, not just of being found out as  _different_  but of  _himself_.

They'd done that to him, put that inside of him, and it had taken someone from outside their world – literally in Harry's case – to see it and correct it before, as Harry had implied was likely, they crippled Clark for life.

In the wake of Clark's return being truly joyous, and this year's leave-taking being much less heartrending as they  _understood_  both in their heads and hearts that it was what was best for him, if hard on them, they'd failed to consider that Potter hadn't yet lived up to some of what he'd told them was his plan: the KGI offices and a place for him to live once Clark was done with his training for good.

And watching him talk to and charm the Talons, pointing out things regarding the building from what they could tell, that was a delay Harry didn't have much intention on allowing to continue indefinitely.

Which, now that he was famously finished with his education, was a good time to turn his eye to expansion…in fact from what they heard on the news and read in the papers, aggressive expansion was the focus of what Harry had been working away at over the summertime in addition to promoting his newest line of fancy gadgets that often cost the earth.

At least publicly, anyway, since due to the conditions surrounding their farming grant, the Kents were well aware that at least one of the conglomerates that had been "merged" with KGI was already in their possession, they'd just done a bit of a song-and-dance for those not in the know of how far-reaching and vast the KGI empire really was.

For some reason they couldn't quite devise the meaning behind, though Martha at least was certain was purposeful, Harry  _wanted_  some of the other heavy-hitters to think he was being a bit rash, perhaps overreaching in his attempt to make his bones and ending up putting KGI in a vulnerable position.

Having dealt with what Potter considered negotiation – one where the entire time he held all the cards – she was certain he had some long-term goal in mind that was served by the appearance of weakness that didn't  _actually_  exist.

He was  _baiting_  someone, that she was sure of…but Martha didn't know enough about his character and end-goals to know who.

"Martha, Jonathon." Harry smiled genially at the couple as they made their way over to say hello.

Jonathon was still more than a little sore over Harry's co-opting of their adopted son, but was at least aware  _enough_  of the danger implicit in the situation that he performed the required niceties whenever they (rarely) had to interact in public given Harry's recent investments in Smallville.

The Kents hadn't been the only ones to benefit from the KGI largess after all, many of the farms or dairies in the area gaining grants or affordable loans to make the switch between conventional methods to organic and/or free range easier and not such a financial hardship. It could take years to make the switch and become certified after all. And during those years, they didn't have the increased revenue needed from higher-value products to defray the higher costs of organic and free-range methods.

KGI's formerly "hidden" agriculture arm had done a world of good – literally, with efforts all over the planet – in allowing smaller family-owned operations to afford the switch, including the Kents and many of their neighbors.

Harry's personal "pet project" as it was being billed in the papers of his coffee roasting operation using organic, shade-grown beans and more "traditional" methods was merely the most recent in his attempts at breathing life into the Smallville community – and in turn lessening the stranglehold that the Luthors enjoyed in the area.

No, Harry wasn't Jonathon's favorite person.

But in comparison to Lionel Luthor, the Kent patriarch would shake his hand and smile any day of the week so long as Harry kept up his efforts to weaken Luthor's monopoly over the town.

"Harry." Martha accepted the kiss to her hand with the blushing grace of the debutante she was before marrying her farmer. "And Meg, how are you?"

"Blooming in the Arizona sun, Martha." Meg Talon responded, "and blushing under the attentions of a young rogue. I see you're familiar with Smallville's new benefactor."

It was part-statement, part-question, and part-fishing expedition. The Potter tycoon had put together one hell of a proposal for her and her family regarding the old theater. And lord knows the money just  _shone_  out at her children and grandchildren. Potter even offered to find a position for any of the Talon staff or the Talons themselves, even if her children and their families chose to move closer to her in Arizona, his company had business all over the world and in all fifty states after all.

Everything  _sounded_  wonderful…on the surface.

But having seen what a  _wonderful_  too-good-to-be-true deal had done to Smallville once before under the authorship of another businessman, canny Meg Talon was a bit hesitant at signing off on another before she got a better bead on the lad.

"We are." Jonathon acknowledged, sharing a glance with his wife. "Of about a year and some now. Harry here is the executor of Clark's late parents' will and his new co-guardian now that our boy has been matched as the missing Kal Ellingson. Speaking of which?" Jonathon eyed Harry. "How goes the search for his sister?"

"Nothing new to report on that front, I'm afraid." Harry gave them all a sorrowful frown. "Kara wasn't as…fortunate as Kal. We managed to track all of her foster-homes but that last one…" He grimaced. "Well. They've been prosecuted and finding a single street-kid is much harder than tracing a ward of the state through their care system."

When Jor-El and Harry put together Kara's backstory, they hadn't anticipated running into such an abusive environment in the last home. Jor-El had selected it due to finding irregularities in the file that would work if they needed to make Kara a runaway to buy more time. What they'd found when Harry and William Clark had gone to "meet" Kara had been nothing short of mass abuses being covered up by the father having a "friend" in a social worker – a double abuse and betrayal. Harry and William had nailed them to the wall, all three of the adults involved getting sentences of no less than twenty years with the "father" being handed a life sentence once all the charges had been totaled.

"You'll find her." Martha played her part, patting the rather excellent actor on his arm, though having heard the story knew that a great deal of his pain was genuine over what he'd found in that foster home. "Just have a bit more faith. It took nine years for Clark to be found and he was here the whole time." She bolstered his "flagging" spirits. "You can't expect miracles to happen all at once, dear."

Eyeing the byplay, Meg nodded to herself.

There was more going on beneath the surface with this trio than met the eye, of that she was certain.

But the lad's remorse over the missing child's situation was all-too-real.

He at least had a heart…and that was more than she could say for most people who'd want to buy and develop or refurbish or, or, or, the old theater.

She'd sell up, and then come back in a year or so and see for herself what he's done with the place.

…

In the end, the purchase and renovation of the Talon theater into Harry's vision of a multi-use building housing the KGI offices, a conference room for use by both his interests and to house things like community groups or book clubs, etc., a bakery storefront where the theater lobby used to be, as well as turning storage areas in the basement and upstairs into either the industrial kitchen for the bakery, storage, and a storm shelter and his future living space in the upstairs, took ten months from start to finish.

He'd made the call to restore the fabulous original woodwork that was present throughout the first and second floors, as well as the deco-period pieces that gave a bit of a fanciful touch to the new bakery and the restrooms. His offices had a modern-deco feel in keeping with the décor, as did the conference room, while the basement became a baker's dream with sleek chrome appliances and white plaster walls. Harry's apartment was a deviation from the modern/deco feel, going back to the original arts-and-crafts era of the building. Polished woodwork, soft fabrics, granite-slab countertops in both kitchen and bathroom, slate flooring in the same, and a rough-hewn rock fireplace in the living room made for a space that was both lush design and endless comfort.

He wished he could move right in, but with it only being the summer of 2000, Kal had another two school-years of training to go, and Harry couldn't be around  _too_  much with his "ward" ostensibly in England for most of the year.

Still, the few times he came through for business that year were spent at least in part gleefully furnishing what was Harry's first true home of his own, with every other place he'd lived – in either timeline – belonging to a relative, a school, or was a family home with years and years of history (and baggage) tagging along.

During that year – which was the same year Kal's original classmates all turned fourteen, with a few of his friends a bit older or younger depending on where they fell in the year – Harry had his first two uses of his "power stripping" serum made from the concentrated Blue-K.

The first, and more vital, was that of Bob Rickman, who despite being treated with the anti-kryptonite-psychosis Blue-K infused water, was still up to his old tricks from the original timeline.

A dart in the ass had taken care of that, and a call had the man scooped up by KGI for testing on his mutation – simple bloodwork and blood samples, no human lab-rats required – before an involuntary admission to an asylum in the U.K., which was easy to arrange due to Bob's "delusion" of being able to command people with a touch.

One thing that Harry had already been aware of – and the reason he was keeping a close eye on Smallvile despite Kal being away much of the year – was that many of the metahuman powers bestowed by meteor exposure required a catalyst.

And no catalyst, he knew from the first timeline's Jor-El, had had such a massive effect on the populace of Smallville as that of meteor-exposed children going into puberty.

Lana Lang became the second serum-dart used, as she'd – unknowingly or not – been spreading her "like me, love me, never leave me" ability through the general population of Smallville for several months, the culmination of which he knew from his history lessons would end in Kal's friend Greg becoming a stalker and kidnapper, Whitney Fordman dying, Kal's eternal infatuation, and her own murder, the first three of which were already signs of being in the early stages of development.

Over Harry's dead and cold body would little-miss-devious get her dirty mitts on either of his trine mates this time.

Ms. Lang may have a harder row to hoe without her meteorite-enhanced pheromones and charisma, but in the end she'd hopefully be a better person for it…an  _alive_  better person at that.

According to the first timeline's Jor-El, the number of meteorite-enhanced metahumans in Smallville was (the first time) over three-hundred strong, many of those being of Kal's generation.

Harry was hoping that his removal of the meteorites after only two years' exposure would help trim that number back, similar to how his his Blue-K anti-psychotic had – as he was well-aware – pared down the number of cases of meteor-exposure-induced psychosis.

Still…only time would tell in the end how effective his methods were.

And at least Kal could rest easy and focus on his training with the knowledge that Harry was watching over his friends and family while he was away.

That alone made it worth it to Harry, what he'd seen and learned of this-time's Kal endearing him to the older soul, over and above the bond formed (potentially) by their trine.

Standing in the back of the bakery during its grand opening, watching Martha Kent – who'd taken the job as chief baker and manager more out of a desire to keep an eye on him than anything else – bustle around the tables and enchant her customers, Harry arched a brow as a figure he recognized from his own past-future separated from the crowd.

Tilting his head towards the hallway, Harry led the way with a scan of his keycard at the secure access door that led back into the KGI offices, not stopping or saying a word to his visitor until he – and they both – were safely inside his soundproofed and bug-swept office.

"I was wondering how long it'd take you to come and see me." He commented to J'onn J'onnz in his human camouflage, the Martian's alien appearance cloaked by that of a handsome black man in his early thirties. "Honestly…I thought it wouldn't be long after Kal left for the Fortress, J'onn."

"I don't know you." J'onn J'onnz said with a flat-aspect which cheered considerably when a packet of Oreos magically found their way to sitting on the desk in front of one of the empty chairs, a glass of milk joining it. "But you apparently know me, Harry-Hazard Potter."

"Call me Har-Zod." He smirked at the open surprise that greeted his revelation, though for the moment there was no hostility to accompany it from the last Martian. "And that's a matter of quantum cosmology…after a fashion."

"Alternate universe?" J'onn arched a brow as he munched on his too-delicious snack. "Or time-travel?"

"A little of both, depending on how you look at it." He shrugged. "I'm currently in my past…but also my and your present."

"Just your mind and soul then." J'onn noted, studying the form seated opposite him. "You have Jor-El's cooperation then, or at least that of the AI running the Repository in the Arctic. You'd also be responsible for the shielding that keeps me out of it now…aren't you?"

"Mmm." Harry hummed in agreement. "You weren't surprised at my name."

It was J'onn's turn to shrug. "When Jor-El, the dead one, not the AI, asked me to watch over his son Kal-El, he informed me of all I needed to know. Kal was destined for a trine, that was known. And given the relationship between the Houses of Zod and El, it wasn't hard to extrapolate from there." He hesitated a moment then admitted: "I also knew Solara. Her death was tragic, but your own never made any sense to me."

"My mother was known for her precognitive abilities." Harry sighed. "Her last visions led to my  _death_  and place here on Terra Sol. You waited to meet me…why?"

"I went to see you when word came that Clark Kent was  _Kal Ellingson_." J'onn tucked away the rest of the remaining Oreos with true regret. Still. He didn't want to eat them all at once, lest he not have any to savor later. "The name alone told me that someone aware of his true persona was involved. And to one who knows what to look for, a Kryptonian is obvious." He cocked his head, eyes darting meaningfully at Harry's eyes and strong form, trailing along his perfectly golden-tan skin. "Jor-El was a scientist. He believed in safety measures and blind-tests and control groups. I knew all along that I was never his only measure in place to protect his son." J'onn frowned. "Though I am concerned with the status of Kara. Is she truly missing?"

"No." Harry told him, leaning on the arm of his comfortable executive office chair. Really, it was little more than a modern throne but  _so_  much more comfortable than wood or stone could ever hope to be. "I've known her location all along and once the Fortress was viable she was transferred there still in stasis." He grimaced. "Zor-El wasn't the faithful brother he liked to project. There has been quite a bit of work done deprogramming the sleeper agent triggers he installed in his daughter, along with other concerns regarding her ability to fit in."

"Yes." J'onn agreed easily with the last. "You lot are known for your… _issues_  with, um…"

"Hubris?" Harry supplied with a laugh. "Superiority? Arrogance? Believing Krypton better than anything else in the 28 galaxies by a ridiculous margin?"

"Yes." J'onn sighed. "That. All of that."

"I work and worked closely with AI Jor-El," Harry explained. "In the present and my past, if that doesn't give you an idea of what Krypton was like nothing will. But I was raised on Terra Sol, the same – if in different circumstances – as Kal. Believe me…I'm well  _aware_  of what Kara needs to learn to be able to live here and not just scrape by on her charisma…"

…

_Timeless Space, Kal's Training Pod_

"You are troubled my son." Jor-El's hologram greeted Kal-El as he entered the vast emptiness of the transition area. He knew it was somehow all at once both very real and very much in his mind. As Jor-El had taught him early-on in his training, just because it was going on in his mind didn't make it any  _less_  real. Clark had had to quickly adjust to his new reality where  _reality_  itself took on a different meaning.

"Yes." He answered the holographic representation of what remained of his father. Jor-El the AI was a rather disconcerting being for Clark. In many ways he was all that he had of his birth parents but at the same time, as Jor-El himself had told him, it was a version of himself without things like regrets or sorrow. On that basis, Jor-El was able to interact with him without feeling grief over his lost wife or the lost years with Clark. But at the same time, that lack of emotional responses also seemed to Clark like a lack of caring as well. Jor-El was an excellent teacher and mentor. That's true. But as a parent…well.

Clark was very glad he had had the Kents during his formative years to teach him things like compassion and modesty.

_Modest_  wasn't really in the Kryptonian lexicon from what Clark could tell.

And after years of training, believe him, he's  _looked._

"Your training is coming to an end." Jor-El commented, trying to decipher what exactly was bothering his son. His  _living_  son which brought with it a whole host of possibilities…not the least of which included his hormonal responses and the effect said hormones had on his adapting physiology. Kryptonians may age quicker and with increased grace over their human counterparts…but even they had to deal with the ravages of puberty. "You have exceeded all of my expectations, Kal." Jor-El smiled. "You truly are growing into the protector and guardian that this world will need in the future."

"Training." Clark sighed. "But not in the real world. This had all been in my head. I know." He said preemptively. "It being in my head doesn't make it  _less_  real. I've seen that for myself when Remus tests me after I wake up in the Fortress. But it doesn't always  _feel_  real." He sighed, shrugging. "I'm just feeling the lack of interaction with people I guess."

It had been a  _long_  several years in many ways.

Having one-on-one interactions limited to only Jor-El the better part of eight to nine months a year hadn't helped the time pass any faster.

Though that was only a matter of perspective, as when he was actively training and learning, his mind was immersed completely, without the self-awareness of time passing or interacting that he was currently doing with Jor-El.

This was little more than a decompression break before he's sent back into the training program.

"You haven't much time left of this intensive program." Jor-El told him. "Only a few more segments, things all sons and daughters of Krypton learn when they come of age and complete their training, which you  _are_  close to, Kal." He soothed the younger consciousness.

"You mean…" Clark chuckled a little. "Like the Kryptonian version of the birds and bees?"

"After a fashion," Jor-El's tone was as dry as one would expect. "Yes. While you have learned almost all of our people's culture, you have yet to learn the ways in which we choose lifemates…or had them chosen for us in some cases. Courting practices, how such things differ. All are important for a young Kryptonian such as yourself to know. You also will have a segment on reproductive and natal biology, and childcare."

Clark made a face.

"I'm only just going on sixteen out  _there_ ," he jerked a thumb in reference to his physical body and the physical world. "Kids and lifemates aren't exactly high on my list. What  _I'd_  like to talk about is Har-Zod…like why I've never met him even though he's supposed to be my guardian."

Or why Jor-El has never discussed anything about this  _one_  Kryptonian's personal history when he's covered everyone from all the members of House El – including both Kal and Kara – as well as House Zod.

Everyone from those Houses, and historical figures too, but not one  _word_  about the older Kryptonian who was serving as guardian over both Clark and his in-stasis cousin.

Which had been a trip and a half when he learned about her.

But then, going from orphan with adoptive parents to having this whole massive family history including a living cousin would be a shock for anyone let alone a transplanted alien teenager.

"As I have told you before, Kal-El." Jor-El frowned in disapproval over his son's dogged return to this same subject. They'd discussed it over and over during his training, and neither of them had ever given so much as an inch to the other. "Har-Zod has his reasons for staying in the shadows. Reasons that will become clear to you once you've finished your training and achieved your majority. Now." Jor-El seemed to type on a display that appeared in the endless space. "Your next segment is ready for you. Learn well, Kal-El." He warned his son. "These things are of greater importance than you yet realize…"


	6. Intermission

**Time and Again**

**Intermission:**

**Days of Endless Summer**

_Smallville, Kansas; July 4, 2002_

Kal made his way carrying the heavily laden picnic baskets from the filling up field that the town used for parking every Fourth of July out by the windmill. Up on that hill the town gathered to enjoy picnic dinners, slapped-together baseball and football games, too much pie, and the annual fireworks put on by the Chamber of Commerce. It was one of his favorite times of year, made even more special this year since for once he didn't have a long – longer for him than for them – separation to half-dread and half-anticipate in the Fall.

Don't get him wrong, he still loved his parents.

The Kents had done the best they could with raising a child they had no real way of comprehending.

Love had never been in short supply, even as things like trust, security, and understanding often came up short…or were completely lacking.

Four years – less than that when you subtracted time for school breaks, making it more along the lines of three years and a couple of months – away was more than enough to change a person, who they were, how they saw themselves and others, even before you take in the timelessness of the training pods that existed in a strata of space-time that allowed more time to pass inside his mind than was actually passing for his physical body.

Kal was a different creature – literally, having finished for the most part with his Kryptonian powers maturing – than the twelve-year-old Clark who had left Smallville in a rush of anxiety and excitement with an arm wrapped around him by who he would come to know as one of the nicest men he'd ever met, a werewolf, and his greatest mentor even above his father Jor-El. In time Kal knew he would settle a bit more into his powers, they might advance – like his speed that never seemed to stop getting faster – but at this point he'd been told not to expect any more cropping up out of the blue. Thanks to the abilities of the Fortress he'd mostly been able to "sleep" through puberty, with his mental-self growing and changing with his physical self. Jor-El had easily taught him to use his powers.

Since apparently his father had visited yellow-sunned worlds while he was alive – including Terra Sol.

Time and perspective had given him an alternate take on who to emulate – and why – which was, he thought, the hardest part for his adoptive parents to handle.

Having to come to grips with the side-effects his father's paranoia and judgmental attitude had fostered in himself, Kal was determined not to be the same.

He didn't  _want_  to live every day afraid of  _what ifs_.

He  _would not_  live life viewing others through a lens of superiority – not like  _either_  of his fathers.

In that, Jonathon and Jor-El had proved disconcerting in their alikeness.

Jor-El, Kal felt, was actually a lot more honest about his prejudices than Jonathon.

Kryptonians were superior.

That was it for his birth father, game over, end of story.

Jonathon's prejudice was much more… _insidious_.

He looked down on anyone that was different than himself and what he was comfortable with…but he wasn't open about it.

It came out in askance looks and disappointed eyes and the occasional rant against the evils of the moneyed elite.

If you didn't live the same hardscrabble "honest" life of a small-town farmer or businessman, if you didn't hold fast to the same ideals of the "country" way of life, if you didn't…and on it went, then Jonathon Kent would snort softly under his breath at you, turn up his nose, and go back to tilling his fields, done with you.

Kal would grant that many of the things his adoptive father idealized  _were_  things of value and he was glad to have learned them, like compassion for the less-fortunate (if not having a very slanted view of what constituted having  _less_ ), helping neighbors, a strong work ethic, but other things he wished he could forget.

Like the fear in his eyes every time Kal's powers had progressed while he was living with them.

Remus Lupin on the other hand hadn't feared him, not ever, not even for a second. Not when he picked up a massive table in the Manor to get a dropped pen. Not when he easily outpaced Padfoot racing through the moors. Not when he learned Calculus in minutes or Catalan in a day. Not even when he'd decided one night during the full moon to join Moony and Padfoot on the moors, as he was invulnerable and well able to safely wrestle with the wolf.

Not even then.

Though he  _had_  been afraid  _for_  him in the last instance, and Kal had gotten an earful over the stunt.

Remus Lupin always kept his cool, controlling the wild thing inside him that told him to rip and tear and bite. He was creative, and innovative, and loved nothing so much as his mate, his godson, and enlightening young minds. Many were the dayw when Kal was adjusting to his new hormones that he would've  _killed_  for Remus's level of calm, even as the werewolf had soothed him with a quiet talk about when Moony had been maturing and wanting to  _mate_  or the antics of his late best-friend James as he fumbled through trying to woo the venerable Lily-Flower.

He helped, simply by being himself.

And Kal hoped that someday he could be that for someone, a helping hand that was always ready to haul you up out of whatever was dragging you down…but maybe with a little of Sirius's antics from his Auror days that Kal had been privy to stories of, catching bad guys and stopping disasters in both the magical and normal worlds.

They were both heroes in very different ways.

Heroes whose influence, limited as it was to thrice a year for a week or two, had had an impact on Kal that was all the more significant for the lack of energy they'd put in to cementing it.

They just were themselves, there for him when needed, and that was all they'd needed to do to show him another way of being besides "Kal-El of Krypton" or "Clark Kent of Smallville."

For one, they'd showed him that it wasn't an  _either/or_  situation.

He could be both or neither, all as it pleased or made sense to him.

Reaching the blanket that Martha was spreading on the ground, Kal made a show of heaving the baskets down with relief, Jonathon chuckling behind him as he brought in the drum of lemonade, both Kents giving him beaming smiles, as they always did when he did a good job "acting" human.

Before they would hand out another assignment, Pete yelled out for "Clark!" across the field from where the football players – which included his friend since he'd tried out during this last year while he was gone – were forming up for a game of touch.

"Go on." Martha laughed, as always jumping on any change to put him in situations with other  _normal_  teenagers instead of whoever he spent with when he was gone. Like that Hazard Potter or the amber-eyed Mr. Lupin. "We'll manage setting up the rest of the way without you now that the heavy-lifting is over. Go on, shoo."

At least one good thing had come from her son spending so much time away, they didn't have to worry about him accidentally losing control of his powers anymore and outing himself.

Though she wished he hadn't already finished his secondary schooling.

Being a graduate at sixteen and going to college already was sure to draw attention when Clark never enrolled at Smallville High School.

She'd tried to convince him – and Harry, though separately – that it was important that he go to high school at SHS the same as every other kid in the area.

To no avail.

Clark wasn't interested in being held back, especially for three years and doing work far below his skill level, and Harry had shot her down without so much as a second's thought…rather rudely in fact, over "trying to keep up appearances being more important to her than what was best for her son."

It had been a chilly few weeks between her employer and herself since, to say the least.

Harry wouldn't be back to Smallville until October from what she understood of the gossip coming out of the KGI offices…which was all to the good as far as she was concerned.

A handful of extra weeks away from Potter's influence and maybe her son could be made to see sense and take up the cause with his guardian…a fact which unavoidable or not given his wrangling still grated on both her and Jonathon, no matter that they'd also benefitted from the arrangement.

Jonathon had a crew of workers on the farm now, between the "stipend" for Clark's adoptive family and the grant issued by KGI, while Martha wasn't stuck solely being a farmwife anymore but was actually  _using_  her degree to manage both the paperwork side of the farm, as she'd always done since her marriage, as well as the Talon Bakery.

She was able to be social again…and she couldn't lie and say she didn't enjoy it.

Martha simply wished it didn't come at such a high cost.

Her sweet little boy  _wasn't_  her little boy anymore.

He had grown up, changed so much, that some days it was hard to look at him and see the toddler who'd reached up and tangled his fingers in her red curls when the meteors brought him with them.

And other days, when he smiled that sweet smile, that was all she could see and she ached to protect him from everything that could hurt him.

As he loped away with an easy grace in his designer jeans and red silk t-shirt, she couldn't help but sigh.

He was still the same boy he'd always been.

He'd just grown up, and sometimes for a mother that was the hardest thing of all.

…

"Clarkbar!" Pete called out, waving frantically as his friend jogged across the field with that effortless grace that made him green with envy sometimes. He rolled his eyes had himself with an inner chuckle. As if it wasn't good enough that puberty had been damn  _good_  to his friend, Clark shooting up to over six feet tall in the last four years, plus having shoulders that had more than one little honey sighing, he was all graceful and shit with it too. Add in the looks, the blue eyes, thick black hair, and a smile that even worked on ice-queen  _Lana Lang_  and you had a killer combo that just wasn't fair to other mortals.

Insult to injury, Clark had even been found as a missing heir to a trust fund complete with a richy-rich education.

At least Pete wouldn't have to deal with being his friend at the same school; rich, handsome, and  _smart_ , Clark was done with high school and set to start with MetU in the fall from what he'd been told at their catch-up session two weeks before when Clark made it home from his last year in England.

"Hey Clark."

"Kent."

"Clark."

The other guys all greeted the formerly-gangly farm boy, Whitney even throwing an arm around him, being one of the few who didn't have to reach up an obscene amount to manage the maneuver.

"I call Kent!" The quarterback called dibs. Whitney had led the Crows to another championship and was also heading for MetU, though he'd be living on campus in the athletic dorms instead of staying at home and studying via correspondence – for the most part – like brainy-Kent.

"Aw, c'mon." Pete groaned and bitched. "I'm the one who called him over…"

"And I'm older and bigger." Whitney arched a blond brow at the fuming boy. "Though I'd be willing to rock-paper-scissors for him."

"When did I become such a hot commodity?" Kal asked one of the football players in an amused aside.

"When you shot up and bulked out." Was his answer filled with no-little amount of envy. "Even if you can't catch for shit, no one wants to have to go up against you and everyone knows you're a fast bastard."

Kal snorted a laugh, both at the explanation and at the betrayed glance Pete shot his own hand when Fordman schooled him with a rock to his scissors, claiming Kal's presence on his team as his prize.

"We're skins, Clark." Whitney told him with a good-natured-slap to his back. "Wouldn't want to mess up your fancy threads…"

Seeing the looks the other players shot his True Religion jeans, Kal found himself glad that his invulnerability extended out an inch or so from his body, or else nothing short of magic would probably be able to salvage his clothes at the end of the day.

Shaking his head with a laugh, he easily stripped off his red silk t-shirt and set it aside on the top of the portable table that had coolers filled with ice water and Gatorade, without the body consciousness that some of the other skins players were showing, his watch and necklace, both with the House of El glyph (though spelled so anyone who didn't know what it was wouldn't connect it with him) engraved on their faces.

Though with golden skin and defined, cut slabs of muscle filling out his chest, Kal didn't have anything  _to be_  self-conscious about when it came to his body.

Including the House of El glyph tattoo that Jor-El had put on his right shoulder blade when he'd finished his training.

Outlined in black with a blue background and dark red glyph, the tattoo gained him an impressed whistle or two from the other players, though like the jewelry, the tattoo was spelled so they'd recall that he had one but not specifically of  _what_  or what it looked like.

"Damn Kent." Pete arched a brow at the sight – both the body and the tat. "Your folks know about that?"

'Cause sure as shit, the Kents wouldn't have taken him to get it or signed for it as required by Kansas law.

Kal shrugged. "Different laws in the U.K., Pete."

"Dude." One of the others said in awed fear. "My parents would  _freak_  if I got a tat without their permission."

"Well, yeah." Whitney said, then pointed out the obvious. "But the Kents  _aren't_  Clark's guardians, remember? That's the rich dude from England. Clark only comes back here because Potter  _lets_  him."

"I thought you were adopted, man." Pete frowned. That didn't sound right to him…

"I was." Kal admitted, easily catching the football tossed his way by Whitney as they wandered over to the open area that was used for the games of touch-football, some of the girls already doing some long-distance flirting with the players as they took the field. "But since they didn't have the signature from my legal guardians it isn't exactly  _legal_ , Pete. They could've gotten into a lot of trouble if Haz had wanted to push it."

"Man, that blows." Was Pete'e summation before trotting over to take his place on the opposing team, Kal tossing the football back to the waiting Whitney and taking his position as receiver.

If Pete only knew…

Still, Kal glanced up at the hot summer sun as it poured into him, making his skin glisten and shine, the radiation filling him and powering him.

There were worse ways to spend the days of summer sun than playing a game of touch and dealing with the Kents' not-very-veiled disapproval.

And it was only for another couple months, no matter how endless the summer always seemed.


	7. Chapter Five

**Time and Again**

**Part Two: Smallville**

" _It used to be thought that the events that changed the world were things like big bombs, maniac politicians, huge earthquakes, or vast population movements, but it has now been realized that this is a very old-fashioned view held by people totally out of touch with modern thought. The things that really change the world, according to Chaos theory, are the tiny things. A butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazonian jungle, and subsequently a storm ravages half of Europe_." - Neil Gaiman,  _Good Omens_

 

 _A/N: There have been a couple of questions about why I've changed the age that Clark met Lex, etc.  The answer is simple: The age gap would make a relationship illegal if/when sex was added to the mix, which is the major reason I've changed the meeting to_  after _Clark is legally considered sixteen_. _There is no_ way _that both Lionel Luthor and/or one of the Kent parents wouldn't have used that against our triad so I had to work around it and making Clark a bit older was the easiest way to do so._

**Chapter Five: …the More They Stay the Same**

_October 16, 2002; Smallville, Kansas_

Kal was hanging out at the Talon Bakery, waiting for school to let out, with vague plans of going over to Pete's and doing his best "normal-genius" impression at the Kents' behest when it happened: Hurricane Chloe struck with its usual vivacious tenacity.

Or in this case, vicious temper, target: one Pete Ross.

"It's an awful tradition!" She railed, indignation at full-blast and directed at Pete. Kal felt sorry for him, for a moment, which was all it took for Kal to realize just  _what_  had her up in arms: the Scarecrow. "Abusive, vile, bullying…!" She continued in that vein for some time, while Kal watched it all in bemusement.

He'd been the latest target of Chloe Sullivan's tenacity after all, he knew full-well what it felt like.

Only in his case, it had been the girl trying to ferret out all the details of his adoption, custody arrangements, and schooling abroad.

Pete had been the one to inflict Chloe on him by virtue of introducing them at the 4th of July picnic between the touch-football game and the first inning of softball.

So to Kal's mind, this was only Pete reaping his just-desserts.

Though for the life of him, he couldn't figure out why, when faced with a pretty, interesting girl like Chloe, who was also a good friend if a bit obsessive at times about any mystery that strikes her fancy, Pete had such a crush on Lana Lang instead of going for the girl who was clearly much more worthy of his affections.

"Clark, some help here?" Pete finally beseeched him verbally since his increasingly desperate glances were getting him nowhere.

"Kal's not going to take your side." Chloe told him bluntly. "He's spent time away from Smallville, which  _should_  have enlightened him to how… _barbaric_  this, this  _assault_  by you football players on a helpless freshman is!"

"His  _name_  is Clark." Pete hissed, narrowing his eyes on her. He  _hated_  that. How Chloe and a few others were so quick to toss aside everything the Kents had  _done_  for Clark.

"His  _name is_ Kal." Chloe reiterated slowly, arching a brow.

"Stop." Kal held up a hand. "You're both right." Before Pete could look too vindicated he completed his thought. "About my name anyway. Yes, my birth and  _legal_  name is Kal Ellingson. But I was also Clark Kent for nine years. I answer to both." He looked around and not seeing Martha finished. "But I think of  _myself_  as Kal, which is why Chloe calls me that since it's how I introduced myself, Pete." He sighed, lowering his hand. "And as far as the Scarecrow tradition goes, I'm sorry Pete." He shrugged. "But I'm with Chloe: it's assault. The football team is lucky no one has ever pressed charges and the  _school_  is even luckier no one's ever sued."

"Dude!" Pete groaned at the betrayal. "It's just a little hazing!"

A few other members of the football team wandered into the bakery in search of Martha Kent's awesome cookies and baked goods to go with the  _really_  awesome coffee that they served. It was more expensive than the stuff they served at the Beanery, but it was worth it. Not the least because more than one family was supported by the KGI coffee roasting plant, who distributed the coffee to the bakery. The bakery also doubled as a storefront for the coffee brand which Potter in his twisted sense of humor (if they had any idea of his origins) had named Kryptonite, selling the roasted whole beans to the locals and any visitors passing through.

It was quite the little industry Hazard had brought to Smallville, one that was growing and expanding all the time, employing more and more of the local populace.

"What's hazing?" Eric Jones, one of the senior football players asked as the girl behind the counter was kept busy handing out various forms of sugar and caffeine to the teammates who were hyped up for the Homecoming game that night.

"The Scarecrow." Chloe folded her arms across her chest as she glared at all of the jocks. "And it's more than hazing, it's assault! Especially if any of those who participate are over eighteen! That could make it a felony depending on how old the poor kid you crucify is!"

"Woah, woah." Jones held up one hand as he accepted his plain coffee from the cashier. The Talon Bakery didn't do fancy coffee, just the basic black in various roasts that the customers could doctor themselves, though they did have a pretty good selection of alternative drinks like lemonade and hot chocolate. "We're not nailing anyone to a cross, Sullivan."

"You don't have to." Kal pointed out as he rose, putting his things away after a look at the clock. He had enough time to walk back to the Kent farm at normal speed to help out a little before getting the prep work for dinner done in time for Martha to get home. "Technically speaking: strapping anyone to a cross and leaving them for any amount of time is crucifixion…and it's considered a banned form of capital punishment in most countries except those where Shari'a law is interpreted to allow it." Waving goodbye with that parting shot, Kal walked away in the direction of the Kent Farm, missing the narrow-eyed glance his response had gotten from Eric, the captain of the football team.

It was a decent walk back to the farm from town, one he enjoyed even though most people found the creeping-in winter temperatures too cold to really enjoy being out-of-doors unless necessary, like for farm work or going to a football game.

Kal wasn't most people though, and the cooling-off temps didn't bother him at all, though he wore a simple leather zip-up jacket in red over his t-shirt, jeans, and red Converse All-Stars to keep up appearances, which was pretty much his standard uniform when in Smallville, only cycling through different colors of shirts and shoes and pairs of jeans, thanks to years of tutelage under Sirius Black, his shirt and shoes generally matched, and he didn't constantly mix together primary colors.

Finding out about red, blue, and yellow being the traditional colors of the House of El had explained a lot.

He'd been subconsciously clinging onto them because they reminded him of home.

A home he'd never be able to return to, though his training had allowed him to mentally see it and spend time there the same as if he'd physically made the journey and found Krypton still intact.

At least he wasn't as alone as he'd always feared… _if_  Hazard ever deigned to actually come and  _meet_   _him_  instead of lurking when he was stuck in the training pod or settling for reports from Remus and the Kents.

Someone Kal had never even met, never seen outside of the random paparazzi shot in the papers, had rearranged his  _entire_ life to take care of Kal, rearranging  _Kal's_  entire life in the process. Remus had thought he didn't notice or know or whatever, but Kal had. Remus wasn't just Hazard's former guardian's husband, he wasn't just Hazard's godfather, he wasn't just Kal's tutor. He was an important part of Hazard's interests in the magical world, according to the  _Prophet_  he was on the board and one of the main engineers involved in importing normal tech to work in the magical world. And  _that_  was who Kal had given up, had take vacation for sometimes months at a time, all so Kal could have an adult figure in his life that wasn't as biased as either Jor-El or the Kents.

More than that, Kal wasn't stupid.

There were much better locations for a coffee roasting plant than  _Smallville_ , let alone subsidiary offices for KGI.

Hazard had done all  _that_ , including hiring his adoptive mother for the Bakery, to help out Kal's childhood home.

It was because of thoughts like this that the truck from the feed store lumbering past him barely registered, let alone the bale of fencing that tumbled off of the back when it hit the bump leading up to the Loeb bridge.

So deep into his thoughts, Kal didn't even register the sound of a high-performance vehicle – the sort of thing that usually  _would_  grab his attention, having been educated in cars by Sirius the same as he had things like clothes and flirting, the Animagus taking up the charge of being an "irresponsible uncle-figure" in Sirius's own words to Kal, feeling that he had enough "sensible" adults in his life already and was in dire need of an outrageous one – coming towards him and coming  _fast_.

Too fast as it turned out, the driver hitting the breaks and cranking the wheel to avoid the bale of fencing, the squeal finally drawing Kal out of his own head and had him snapping around to view the – literal – wreck happening while he was brooding.

As if in slow-motion, Kal peeled out of his laptop's backpack and his leather jacket, dropping them on the asphalt as the car – a silver Porsche 911 GT2 he noted, spying the decal on the back of the car – went crashing through the guardrail, the momentum and force of impact too much for the rail to handle sending both car and driver plummeting into the river, Kal scenting blood even as he bolted behind the car, instincts and training taking hold in a perfect storm before his conscious mind even engaged.

This was it after all, what he'd been sent here – as in  _to Earth_  – to do: save people.

Granted, he was pretty certain from all his talks with Jor-El that his father had meant more from galactic invaders and hurricanes…but hey, he had to start somewhere.

Calculating his trajectory in less than an instant to avoid hitting the car and causing damage he'd have no way to explain, Kal dove with perfect form from the fresh break in the bridge, hitting the water clean and slicing through it with a few super-human strength kicks of his legs and slices of his arms. Using his enhanced vision, he saw that the blood was from a head-wound, the driver – bald, young, well-dressed – unconscious. Speeding up with no danger of being seen, one over-powered strike of his elbow had the glass of the driver-side window breaking and a harsh tug on the seatbelt had it breaking off and releasing the man from what would have been a watery grave. Tucking his wounded cargo in his arms, Kal let his feet hit the riverbed before springing up in a lateral leap that would have had him launching into the air if he'd done it on dry ground instead of just up to the surface of the river thanks to the water-resistance.

Breaking through the surface, Kal kicked himself and his rescue over to the riverbank using human speed since he easily caught the sounds of a pair of concerned Smallvillians pulling over and clambering out of their cars. Making the dry riverbank as they made it to the break in the guardrail, he called over his shoulder to the gawkers: "Call 911! He's not breathing!" As they broke away to do as he said, Kal regulated his strength to just above human and pumped firmly against the unbreathing man's diaphragm several times, leaning down to give a rescue breath, then starting compressions again.

He'd gotten about halfway through his next repetitions when the still form coughed, water spewing up from burdened lungs as Kal swiftly turned him onto his side.

…

Sucking in frantic breaths, Lex felt a panic he'd once been all-too familiar with as his lungs palpated in desperation and his throat burned, the pain from the compressions only increasing his fear until he was at last able to calm and suck down a steady, full breath.

Hadn't even made it all the way out to the castle, let alone the plant, and Smallville was already out to finish the job it started with the meteor shower thirteen years ago.

Lionel had been in rare form over the summer, really putting Lex through his paces since he'd finished his Ph.D. As they'd agreed, Lionel had left him – mostly – alone while he finished his education, but the moment school was released, he'd been jerked between Lionel in Metropolis and his uncle in England. Seeing Julian healthy, happy, and above all  _untainted_  by Lionel's toxic influence made all the frustration worth it…and knowing that he was close to being able to leave LuthorCorp for his own company made all the difference, even when Lionel got antsy over the rumblings in the business world about just  _how much_  LuthorCorp stock wasn't in Luthor hands anymore and sent Lex to oversee a  _crap factory_  of all endeavors.

Though…his recent  _indiscretion_  with the Metropolis Mayor's twin eighteen-year-old son and daughter  _probably_ , maybe, okay, yeah, definitely had something to do with it as well.

It didn't exactly  _look good_  when Lionel couldn't keep his heir from being caught with not one but  _both_  children of his favorite political  _pet_.

To make matters worse, Lionel had started in with dire words about  _legacy_ and  _inheritance_ , all-but making twenty-two-year-old Lex break out in hives at the thought of his father trying to  _arrange_  a match with one of his cronies' kids.

Like that awful Victoria Hardwick he'd tried to push on him just before his mother's death.

He had to give Lionel credit for sheer  _timing_  with this latest debacle that almost prematurely ended his heir. If his father hadn't called at  _just_  that moment, Lex knew he would've seen the obstruction sooner, preventing his nearly-watery-death. And that had been a new GT2…

Lex didn't remember much, obstruction, breaks, swerve, flash of red, then hit the barrier and his head, knocking him thankfully out and preventing him from panicking as his lungs filled with water and hindering his own rescue.

After all, there were worse ways to come around than to the feeling of soft lips on his, firm hands on his chest, and the sight of a man so beautiful he almost mistook him for an angel if not for the burning pain in his chest and the laughable idea of Lex going to heaven, especially taking into consideration his ongoing love affair with hedonism.

As his lungs worked overtime to clear themselves, Lex felt his beautiful rescuer – at least that's the theory he was working on given the data at hand – turn him on his side and rub his back with a firm gentleness that belied the strength they'd just been using to force the water from his lungs.

Finally in possession of a cleared airway, Lex rolled back a bit and sat up with a wince for the newest reminder of his current misadventure: the throbbing and pounding pain in his skull that was making itself known as Lex with the help of the too-pretty-for-Smallville man, stood on legs that were a bit weak – through from the strong hands on his body or the car wreck he wasn't certain.

Staring in amazement at the hole in the bridge's barrier, easily seen from their place on the riverbank below, and making – and solving – rapid equations regarding things like the speed of his car, the impact of the crash, height of the bridge, and an estimated depth of the river, Lex came to a single conclusion: his rescuer, given the crushed-ruby color of his clinging-wet t-shirt – and wasn't  _that_  a sight to warm him despite the cool fall air – and how quickly he must have pulled him from the water had seen the wreck and  _dove_  in to save him from the bridge.

"Thank you." He said, voice a bit faint as his pupils nearly swallowed the silver-blue-grey of his eye color in his shock. "You…you saved my life."

"I did what any good person would do." His rescuer told him with utter seriousness that took Lex aback for a moment. What  _good people_  did wasn't generally a consideration when you had Lionel Luthor for a father. He  _definitely_  wasn't in Metropolis anymore. Though the sex-and-chocolate voice of his rescuer didn't disappoint, matching the luscious ink-black hair that dripped down onto perfect golden-tan skin. Bright blue eyes were every bit as earnest as his words, and the body, like the looks, on the man was nothing short of divine.

Lex hadn't  _wanted_  anything for his own like this in his life, not even the Mosler concept car that the greedy Floridian bastards refused to part with, even for a Luthor.

It took him aback, much like his rescuer's easy response to his thanks.

"I'm Lex Luthor." He told him, already planning out a complex plan of attack to nab the gorgeous creature for his own.

"Kal Ellingson." Kal extended his hand with a bright smile, feeling a bit of a tingle when Lex took it in his own, finding himself a bit surprised to feel calluses on the elegant pale hand. Lex was younger than he'd originally thought from the brief glimpse he'd gotten mid-accident, the bald head giving a false sense of age at first glance. His eidetic memory pulled up the little he knew about the Luthor heir from the newspapers, placing Lex as the hard-working genius and even harder-partying twenty-two-year-old Alexander "Lex" Luthor. On who'd notably lost his hair during the Smallville meteor strike of 1989. "Good to meet you…though I wish the circumstances were better."

Lex gave a sharp laugh at that as he felt a moment of disquiet over the sheer  _possessiveness_  filling him as sirens rang through the air and concerned citizenry ran down, calling out to them…though they were calling out for a "Clark" not a Lex or a Kal.

Seeing the puzzled glance on Lex's face, Kal answered the unspoken question as Mr. Simpson ran over with his things from the bridge, his wife following with a pair of emergency blankets as Kal easily tracked the first responders that would arrive within a few more minutes. Taking one of the blankets, he unfolded it and wrapped it around lean shoulders that were shaking with controlled shivers.

"I was adopted as a John Doe." He told the other man in a whisper, voice too low for the gossipy Mrs. Simpson to overhear. "Clark Kent was the name my adoptive parents gave me."

"Kal Ellingson being your birth name." Lex nodded, putting the pieces together with ease…though the story sounded familiar.

"Here you are Clark." Mr. Simpson handed over his jacket and backpack once the six-four teenager had wrapped the second blanket around himself. "Didn't want these to wander off."

"Thanks, Mr. Simpson." He answered politely, Lex watching everything with observant eyes and brows that arched as they put a price tag to the leather jacket and bag, turning his head a bit to take in the soaked-through designer jeans as the shirt that finally registered as silk.

No, someone like Kal was the  _last_  thing he thought he'd encounter in nowhere-Hell-Kansas.

"Saw what you did, Kal." Mrs. Simpson gushed. "We were in the car right behind that flashy silver thing. You just took off, no hesitation, right into the water!"

"It was the right thing to do, that's all." Kal demurred, blushing lightly more from the intense looks he was fielding from Lex than modesty over Mrs. Simpson's praise.

Before too much time had passed, the embankment became busy with emergency personnel and sheriff's deputies as they tried to figure out what had happened – and who was at fault, which ended up being squarely on the supply truck driver for not securing his load better after taking statements from Lex, Kal, and the ever-helpful Simpsons.

Lex was feeling more than a little chilled and damp waiting for Enrique to drive over from getting the castle set-up with one of the other cars, mourning a bit for his beloved GT2 and casting discretely-heated glances at the heroic Kal Ellingson-Kent, when a farm truck roared to a halt, a handsome middle-aged man running for Kal almost before the rig was off and the breaks on.

"Clark! Clark, are you okay? What were you  _thinking…_ " Jonathon grabbed hold of his son by the upper arms, absently noting by touch what his eyes had been telling him for months: his little boy wasn't so little anymore. Eyes tracking all over Clark, he noted the still-soaked pants and the damp shirt, but the pile of dry pack and jacket on the ground. Clark had used at least  _some_  of his abilities to pull the idiot driver out of the water. "Who's the maniac that was driving that car?" He demanded, eyes locking on the similarly-blanket-draped form over to one side.

A blanket-draped form that made him gain a sinking feeling with one look at the young face and bald head.

He only knew  _one_  person in the entire world who matched that description who would have reason to be running around Smallville in designer clothes and a driving a sports car – way too fast according to the explanation the deputy who'd called him had given.

"Dad, it's fine…" Kal tried to derail Jonathon, to no avail.

"That would be me." Lex stepped forward. "Lex Luthor. Your son Kal saved my life."

"So I heard." Jonathon scowled, both at the name confirming his suspicions and at the name Clark had given the Luthor heir. He knew  _why_  Clark had started using the name: he felt it was more  _him_  – an alien, than adopted Clark Kent. With his powers and his mind being what they were, Jonathon even understood trying to forge that connection to feel less alone. He even knew  _when_  it had started: this last summer when he'd first been introduced to Chloe Sullivan and had given his name as Kal. That didn't mean he had to like  _or_  accept the change or that he didn't feel slighted. Like the name his  _parents_  had given him wasn't good enough anymore. It was just one more in a series of things that had changed since Hazard Potter showed up on the Kent farm that stuck in Jonathon's craw. "What were you doing driving that fast anyway?" He demanded. "There's speed limits in this country for a  _reason_ , you're not in Europe anymore Luthor, someone could've gotten hurt…"

"Someone did, Dad." Kal pointed out quietly, watching with wide-eyes as Jonathon ripped into Lex who just stood there blank-faced and took it. " _Lex_. He was unconscious when I pulled him out of the car. He would've  _died_ …"

Jonathon just shook his head and slung an arm across Clark's back, ushering him over towards the truck and their ride home, barely allowing time for his son to reach down and snag his things from the ground.

"See you around, Lex." Kal called, with an apologetic smile for the wounded – in more ways than one – man.

"Yeah." Lex answered quietly, hands tightly fisted on the ends of the scratchy, cheap blanket the only outward sign of his inner turmoil. "See you."

Soon. He added mentally, reconfiguring his plan of attack with the overt-aggression he'd been treated to by farmer Kent. If he had his way – and Luthors often did, they made  _sure_  of it – he'd see Kal sooner than the young man would think.

Enrique barely gave a glance at the buzzing bees of the gawkers and the emergency responders as he pulled up in the four-by-four Range Rover that was the main vehicle for the castle staff to use to run errands – or in this case pick up their new wayward employer. Well, some for some of them anyway. About a third of the staff had been with Lex for years, personally selected and vetted to be Lionel-influence-free, including Enrique. The others drew their checks from Lionel and as a result were automatically suspect.

"The insurance company has already been notified, Mr. Luthor." Enrique told him at once, after Lex was granted clearance to leave by the sheriff, filling in his employer as they walked over to the luxury SUV. "And a replacement GT2 with the same specifications should arrive next week. In the meantime," Enrique told him as Lex climbed into the passenger seat, silently acceding to the EMT's wishes to not drive until he'd rested for a few hours. "I've already ascertained that your collection has arrived safe and sound and are ready to be driven." Sending his boss a speaking glance that took in the rural area, he added: "Might I suggest the Vanquish rather than one of the more ground-hugging options?"

Such as the Lamborghini that was usually Lex's second-favorite car to drive, in silky ink black that reminded Lex of Kal's hair.

"Probably wise." Lex admitted sardonically. "Since I doubt most of my collection would fare well on farm roads."

"I daresay not, Mr. Luthor." Enrique sniffed. "The very idea…"

"I want to know everything there is to know about one Kal Ellingson." Lex said long moments later, closed eyes cracking open just a bit to impress the seriousness of his order on his right-hand. "Something about his name is familiar, like I know it from somewhere. He also goes by Clark Kent, and has a very disagreeable man for an adoptive father. I want to know about both: birth family and his adoptive family. And." He added after another moment's thought, turning events over in his memory. "I want to know why Kal dresses in designer wear and looks like a supermodel while his erstwhile father drives a beat-up old truck and dresses in Walmart-chic. Something doesn't add up about the situation, something's missing." He scowled darkly. "And I want to know  _exactly_  what it is…"

Arriving at the castle, Lex had a scant hour and a half to rest and clean-up before needing to leave for the plant.

Attired in a fresh suit in his preferred dark grey with a light smoke colored button down and silver cufflinks, his watch from his mother on his wrist, Lex made quite the figure rolling up to the LuthorCorp Fertilizer Plant No. 3 in his smoke-finish custom Aston-Martin Vanquish, or as Julian called it his "007" car.

The plant manager at first didn't realize just  _how close_  Lex was, and he did have to admit he got more than a moment's vindictive pleasure at overhearing Sullivan speaking of him derisively only to have to immediately backpedal when the heavy-set plant manager turned around and came face-to-face with none other than the bald "daddy's baby-boy" he'd  _just_  been talking about.

Were he in a better mood, Lex wouldn't have left him to sweat over the security of his position – but having already been treated like crap once today by Farmer John, he wasn't interested in a replay from his own damn  _employee_.

Oh, he'd assured him that the plant  _employees_  were safe…but he'd made no such assurances for plant managers who liked to talk out of turn.

If the manager was as competent as the reports he'd reviewed had suggested, then Sullivan really had nothing to worry about.

Lex could be vindictive, but nothing like his father.

He wouldn't fire a man just for the pleasure it brought him, unlike Lionel who had an appalling lack of ability to separate private and public.

Faced with something like the derision Sullivan had preemptively spewed, the Suicide Slums thug would have come out to play, as despite all of Lionel's talk of heritage and legacy, it had been his  _wife_  and her connections that had turned the shady "new money" bruiser into a legitimate businessman to be feared if not respected.

Still and all, when he left the plant well after dark, Lex hadn't the slightest inkling of what he'd find…

…

Kal spent a tense ride listening to Jonathon chew his ear off over using his powers, especially to help a Luthor, which eventually devolved into one of his adoptive father's rants about Luthors in general and the party-hard lifestyle of Lex in particular, finishing as they rolled up to the farmhouse with a dire warning about getting mixed up with the good-for-nothing-rich-asshole.

Gee, dad, tell me how you really feel?

"Did you call Hazard?" Kal interrupted him before he could haul in another breath for yet another rant as they tromped inside, Kal using his speed to run upstairs, change/clean-up, and get back downstairs before Jonathon even noticed.

"No." Jonathon said mulishly, a grim cast to his face. "It didn't see the need."

"Didn't see the  _need_?" Kal raised his brows in surprise. He knew the Kents weren't the biggest  _fans_  of Hazard, they'd liked the peace-of-mind he'd given him but not the source from what he could tell. But not to  _tell_  him when something like this happened was no better than a slap in the face. And if Hazard Potter was anything like Remus and Sirius's stories of him, or if Har-Zod had any of his father  _General Zod_  in him, then he'd definitely notice and take offense – something which Kal wasted no time in pointing out. "It's not like it's going to stay a secret in  _Smallville_  of all places." Kal told him, eyes wide in panic. "He's going to hear about it eventually. And then he'll be doubly hacked-off that  _we_  didn't tell him ourselves."

"I said there's no point, Clark." Jonathon snapped out, turning to storm from the room and check on the hands. "Don't you have a Homecoming game you were invited to by your  _real_  friends? You should be worried about  _that_  instead of some alien asshole who keeps butting into our lives. Make sure you do your chores before you leave."

And that, as far as Jonathon was concerned, was the end of that.

Kal groaned, cursing in Kryptonian under his breath as he raced upstairs to grab his cellphone – a KryPhone which both Pete and his other friends had drooled over when it showed up in the middle of the summer – which had certain important numbers already programmed.

Rushing through his "chores" which with Martha's job in town and the hands out on the farm mostly consisted of dinner prep and household work like laundry and dishes, Kal thumbed open his contacts folder as he made sure he had everything he'd need for the night tucked away in his jacket pockets.

Wishing absently that the Kents had loosened up a bit on letting Hazard buy him a car for his birthday – even just so he'd blend in a little better instead of being the weird guy who walked every-frickin'-where – he tapped out a message to Haz – a nickname he'd picked up from their shared relationship with the Black-Lupins – on the touchscreen, making sure to slow down his speed so the phone could pick it up. The phone – like the one Hazard probably had if Kal were to venture a guess – was calibrated to pick up a lot more a lot faster than the standard ones like Martha toted around…but it still wasn't quite up to Kal-speed. It was a simple message, along the lines of "saved guy in car wreck, Jonathon pissed."

Little did he know, that  _that_  message was one Harry/Har-Zod "Hazard" Potter had been waiting to receive for the better part of eleven years, as he ran back into town to meet up with Chloe, Greg, and a few others who were all going to the Homecoming dance as a group.

It was nice to be around others his nominal age, even if he was still the "strange one" of the group.

At least now it was because he'd ended up with a trust-fund and early graduation instead of being the weird Kent-kid that was almost a shut-in his parents were so uptight the way it was most of his early years when they were going to school and his was homeschooled and not allowed to participate in any of the normal kid activities whether it was cub scouts or t-ball.

Honestly, if it wasn't for church when he was young – another change since his views on  _that_  were just one more thing his parents were pissed off about – he probably wouldn't have made any friends at all, let alone the few he did have.

Rounding the corner to the Beanery – at normal speed even – Kal was startled out of his wits when he suddenly stumbled, bringing back awful memories from when he was younger, that – yep, he sighed mentally as he glanced down at who he'd fallen on in a rare graceless moment – always happened around Lana Lang. Spotting the glowing necklace around her neck he cursed under his breath as he shakily got to his feet, senses dulled for the moment, extending a hand to help her up even as he apologized.

"Sorry, Lana." He shifted restlessly, eyes darting between her shocked/amused/appreciative (when she realized  _who_  was responsible for the whole scene) dark brown eyes and the ominously glowing green rock around her neck. Despite their best efforts, the Haz – as explained by Jor-El – hadn't managed to  _completely_  expunge every trace of Kryptonite in and around the Smallville area. Case in point: Lana Lang's necklace. Nell Potter (no relation to Haz's adoptive parents) between her  _relationship_ with Lionel Luthor and her family business – and family money – had no need to turn in the pretty bauble for a few hundred dollars, especially when it was a favorite piece of her orphaned niece. So Kal always looked like an idiot around her, though now he knew it was her necklace and  _not_  some weak-kneed eternal-love debacle. "I guess I don't know the size of my own feet sometimes…" He shrugged, putting on his best gee-shucks bashful impression.

"That's okay, Clark." She told him kindly, fiddling with her hair as she peered flirtatiously up through fanned-out lashes. Lana  _may_  be dating this year's captain of the football team, having succeeded with Eric where she'd failed with Whitney Fordman, and be the assistant head cheerleader, but this was  _Clark_. Nabbing him with his looks – and his money – would be a one-way ticket to getting Nell off her back for good. And the thought of those big hands on her gave her more than a tingle. "I wasn't looking where I was going anyway."

They were chatting for a bit, neither noticing that they were being watched – by more than one pair of eyes.

Up high from a second-story window, emerald-green eyes took in the scene – both the two teens and their seething muscle-bound audience – before making the decision to let things play out.

"The more things change." Harry murmured to himself, one strong arm propping him up as he leaned in to watch through the window. He'd arrived via his super-speed, knowing that the car accident was a catalyst for so much more. Haz hadn't expected for a slightly-altered version of  _this_  little incident to play out before his very eyes. But if it went much the same way, then it would only solidify the mutual-interest between Lex and Kal – something that would be very much needed once he made an open entrance into town next week. "The more they stay the same…" He shook his head, bemused, before moving over to his laptop that he'd set on the desk in his bedroom. He had a few hours at least before Jeremy Creek – if events continue on this similar path – made his attempt at murder. Might as well get some work done while he waited.

…

Eric Jones stormed around the corner behind Clark Kent, furious.

He didn't know what the fuck was going on between him and his girl, but he knew he didn't like it.

What he  _didn't_  expect was to see Kent holding up Lana's necklace in one hand by the chain with a frown.

The quarterback moved quickly, shoving Kent from behind with both hands, the necklace hitting the ground inches away from Kent's face.

"I don't know  _what_  the fuck you thought you were proving in the Bakery, Kent." Jones growled, flipping the slightly-larger teen over onto his back and putting one booted foot square in the middle of his chest. "Or what the hell is going on with you and Lana. But I do know  _one thing_." He leered down, easily nabbing the necklace and settling it in place on Kent's neck, resting against his chest. "I think we're going to make an exception for this year's Scarecrow…"

…

Kal had never known pain like this before.

Not even when he'd been training with his guardians-not-guardians in England to be able to out-race spellfire.

Magic was different from regular physical harm, and as a result (and no, he didn't want to think of just  _how_  they'd figured it out with Hazard) Kal could be hurt or even killed by it, creating the necessity to train against it.

Thankfully, all spells had a distinctive color-wave as it was coming towards you, and only a few rare spells were colorless to the human eye, but even those with practice had colors visible on a spectrum that Kal could see.  _That_  had been a fun few days as Remus had tried to describe something for Kal that Remus couldn't even see. They'd had to work half-blind with only descriptions provided by Haz, who was once more off in Japan making technology deals or in the Amazon working on earth-friendly coffee-growing practices or what have you.

But this?

There was no fighting it, no dodging it.

Green kryptonite hurt on every level, sapping his strength and invulnerability, making him exposed to the straining pain of his muscles as they tried to hold him up and prevent his lungs from being injured or to the freezing mid-October night.

Kal could see his breath on the air, and for once it wasn't because he was using his freezing wind ability.

Adding insult to injury: Eric had set his leather jacket with its cellphone on the ground at his feet where he could see but not reach the sweet salvation it offered.

All he could do was crane his neck as far forward as possible and pray that either the football players or a passerby let him down from the cross in the middle of Ripley Field that he was strapped to.

As if to answer his mental plea, the cornstalks to his right rustled, a thin figure with a bit of a sharp face pushed through the field, eyes alighting on Kal's shivering, pained figure with knowing sadness – and a strange sense of glee that puzzled Kal.

"Never changes." The figure spoke in a tsking tone.

"Help me." Kal said weakly as it moved closer, bringing himself into view in a set of clothes that somehow seemed out of place with the benevolent menace it exuded. For some reason, Kal got the idea that this was the sort of person that he'd want to help…but that  _help_  was the last thing he was after.

"Hurts doesn't it?" The young man asked in mild tone just as knowing as his eyes.

Kal didn't see any point in answering what was clearing a rhetorical question.

"I thought if I punished them it would stop." The figure said, then gave Kal a blood-chilling smile. "But it never stops."

Turning away, the young man paused as Kal spoke again.

"Wait." Kal said, a bit incredulous. "Where are you going?"

"Homecoming dance." The man said simply, giving rise to answers about his  _knowingness_  over Kal's predicament. "I never made it to mine."

"You're just going to leave me up here?"

"You're safer where you are."

Kal moaned in pain as the figure darted away through the corn, only to hear what he  _thought_  was the sound of a car's tires squealing to a stop a few minutes later.

With nothing to lose, he tried again, this time calling louder in hope that  _someone_  had realized where he was and what had happened.

"Help me!"

…

Lex had brought the Vanquish to a jarring halt at the sight of who he thought was Jeremy Creek hopping the fence to the same corn field where Lex had seen him hung up all those years ago – Ripley Field, the same field where Lex lost his hair.

Eyes staring after the figure – or maybe it was just a shadow after all – Lex turned back to his car only to hear something he never thought he'd hear again: someone calling for help out in Ripley Field.

"Fucking Smallville." He cursed, aware of the tradition from his early introduction to it via Jeremy and well-aware of it being Homecoming tonight thanks to the excited gossip running rampant through the plant. Going to his glovebox, Lex grabbed out the flashlight all his cars had in case of emergency and hopped over the fence with an athletic ease that gave proof to the muscle hidden behind the well-cut suits and his scientist-businessman-playboy veneer. "Fucking hick jocks."

From pure memory Lex made his way to the center of the field where sure-a-fucking-nough there was a figure tied to a fucking cross.

Getting closer, he felt a moment of pure shock as he realized just who it was hanging there: none other than his  _own_  savior.

"Kal?" He asked in disbelief, even as his eyes tracked greedily over all that muscle displayed to advantage by his painful – and ignoble – position as the honorary "scarecrow" complete with painted-on red "S" and being stripped to his – rather sexy to Lex's mind – skin-tight silvery-blue silk boxer-briefs. "What the hell…who did this to you?"

"Doesn't matter." Kal told him as Lex undid the ropes holding him to the wooden cross, falling forward in sheer relief as his muscles released their strained position, the necklace flying off as he hit the ground on his hands and knees. "Just dumb rednecks who don't like it when their captain's girl gives me the eye."

Feeling his strength rushing back, Kal hid the regained power surging through him even as he gave the necklace a look of pure loathing. He'd be happy to leave the fucking thing where it was but that was a bad fucking idea. Better to put it away somewhere than have it turn up at the least convenient moment.

Putting on a show of being sore and tired – but not injured – Kal patted down his jacket in search of his phone.

"Kal, you need to see a doctor." Lex told him firmly, coming over to his side and helping prop the larger man up, taking a visceral – and really, really inappropriate considering how it came about – thrill in having that warm body pressed against his side.

"No, I'll be okay." Kal told him even as he opened up his phone and made a call, Lex helping him as he stepped unsteadily – really, he should get an Oscar for this… - into his jeans, ignoring his socks and stomping bare feet into his Converse as the other phone picked up. "Haz?"

"Let me guess." The smooth British voice Kal had only heard via phone a couple times before asked with no-little amount of humor. "You're in the middle of Ripley Field with Lex Luthor and Jeremy Creek is about to go full-psycho on the Homecoming Dance."

"Yeah…actually." Kal held out the phone a moment, frowning at it before putting it back to his ear. "How'd you know?"

"Lucky guess." Harry rolled his eyes. Seriously. Redneck jocks were one of those things he  _wished_  had changed with the new present-and-future he was piloting. "Let Lex take you home, I've already dealt with Jeremy." Harry turned and eyed the now-depowered mutant who was slumped over at his feet. "He needs help, I'll take him to a hospital where they'll handle it. And Kal?"

"Yeah, Haz?"

"Make sure that necklace goes with you. I know it makes you uncomfortable but I don't want it growing legs and wandering off…"

 _Click_.

Kal stared down at his phone in pure bafflement for a moment before tucking it back into his jacket and shrugging into both it and his shirt that Lex was holding out.

"Going to let me take you to the doctor now?" Lex arched an expectant brow as Kal leaned down and scooped up the necklace, tucking it away in his outermost jacket pocket, hating the way it made him feel even with the lead-coated-fibers that Jor-El used to create a layer of insulation in all of his outerwear.

The lead took the edge off and was supposed to be a just-in-case/better-safe-than-sorry measure, but with his longer exposure from earlier he was still pretty sensitive to kryptonite, and would be until he got some time under the sun to recharge a bit.

"Nope." Kal gave him a soft smile. "But I will let you take me home."

"Okay…" Lex drawled, wrapping one arm around Kal's waist as the taller man slung his arm back around his shoulder. "Was that your date to the dance that was so important you had to call despite just being crucified?"

"No." Kal chuckled a little at the thought. Maybe because of first how he was raised and then his training or maybe it was an alien thing, but the thought of dating anyone from the high school just left him cold. "I didn't have a date, for one. Was just going to catch up with some friends, you know? That was my guardian, wanted Haz to know I was okay when I didn't show up where I was supposed to be with everything that's gone on today. Though…" He frowned. "Somehow he already knew what was going on. If I didn't know any better I'd say he's bugged my phone…"

"Could he do that?" Lex was never one to second-guess another's justified paranoia. And since Enrique had already provided him with a synopsis on Kal Ellingson/Clark Kent that explained the adoption, double name, and just  _why_  he'd sounded so damn familiar – he'd been subjected to more than one rant by his father on the subject of Harry "Hazard" Potter – he knew that "Haz" was said Potter, KGI CEO. And if Potter was anything like Lionel, then bugging his ward's cell was well within the realm of possibility.

"Maybe." Kal shrugged. "I know my phone is a one-of-a-kind edition that he designed for my birthday. And since he does a lot of the R&D stuff…he probably could've put a GPS tracker on it or something."

"Cell phones already have GPS." Lex commented on that as his Vanquish came into view. "All he'd have to do is set it so it's always on and you can't turn it off."

"Hmm." Was all the response he got to that, then was served another one of those devastating grins. "If a Vanquish is your backup car, I really need to work on my parents letting Haz buy me that truck he's been hinting at for months." Especially since he knew from Sirius's raptures over the same car that Hazard had had custom-designed by Aston-Martin how much one cost…and that was before the extras guys like Haz and Lex tended to splurge on for custom and after-market upgrades.

"Somehow." Lex said dryly, thinking of the reception he'd gotten from Jonathon Kent. "I don't think Lex Luthor has a car  _collection_  is going to be a valid point to your parents for Hazard Potter buying you a car if being a teenager with a rich guardian hasn't worked already."

"Here we are." Lex said as he pulled the Vanquish into the Kent Farm. "Casa Kent. Are you feeling steadier or do you want…?"

"No, no." Kal raised a hand halting that offer before it could be fully formed. "My dad wasn't exactly  _happy_  earlier after everything…seeing me come in with you and like this?" He shook his head ruefully, a half-smile on his face. "Better not."

"Alright." Lex conceded, not wanting to push the beautiful boy too far, too fast. "You know, I still owe you for saving my life…"

Kal threw back his head and laughed.

"I think we can call it even since you got me off of that cross." Kal said finally, wiping a laughter-induced tear from the corner of his eye. "Besides…after this? I'd say we're friends. And friends don't operate on debts and markers and who owes who."

Lex arched a brow. That would be a first in his experience. But then…as isolated as he was during his youth and then once he grew up the people he'd been around hadn't exactly given him anything close to a "normal" friendship. In fact the closest he'd ever come was Duncan at Excelsior but they'd lost touch after Lex went off to Princeton…or maybe his Uncle James after his mother left Lionel.

"Friends" wasn't a word that usually had a place in a Luthor's vocabulary.

"Well." He said a moment later, peering through the windshield at the house where he saw a curtain rustle. " _Friend_ , if I'm not mistaken your mother just peeked out looking for her errant son. Wouldn't want to keep a lady waiting now would we?" Lex gave Kal one of his patented smirks, the younger man rolling his eyes a bit with a sigh before opening the door to the sports car and climbing out.

Resting his hands on the top of the car roof and the door, Kal leaned back in.

"You know, tomorrow's the last farmer's market of the season." He led with a non-sequitur. "If  _I_  was a wealthy scion of a business with a crappy – forgive the pun – reputation around town, that's probably where  _I'd_  start with gathering some goodwill…"

Lex laughed, blue-grey eyes shining as Kal gently closed the door to the car.

He may not have Kal's number – yet – but considering that the Kent Farm sold produce, that was the next-best-thing to an actual date as he'd likely get at this point.

One he wasn't too proud to take Kal up on, not with the memory of cobblestone abs and a cut chest, combined with Adonis-like looks and a tight ass fresh on his mind.

And even if Lex disregarded the physical…Kal Ellingson-Kent was probably the closest thing he'd ever met to a genuine  _good person_  in his life, almost too good to be true.

A smart man wouldn't let him slip away.

Lex Luthor had been called many things in his life, but  _stupid_  wasn't one of them.

Waving softly when Kal turned to see him off, Lex put the car in gear and drove – at a sedate pace that chafed at him for the benefit of the parental units – out of sight, plans forming and reforming in his tricky mind once more, all surrounding a pretty sixteen-year-old with crystal-blue eyes.

…


End file.
